


The Play's The Thing

by tigersilver



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: A play within a play, Emotions, Fluff and Angst, HD Big Bang 2011, Humor, M/M, Snark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:35:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 29,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26158891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tigersilver/pseuds/tigersilver
Summary: Harry Potter is not happy with the life he's landed in. He's trained to be an Auror, was invited to be one, but now he's considered too valuable—and too powerful—to be allowed out in the field. He faces a life of paperwork and filing, migraine headaches and the petty miseries of being a desk jockey. Draco Malfoy has just returned to his native England from Romania, where for a few years he worked his tail off at the Dragon Preserve. Now he requires a paying position and Malfoys are still somewhat persona non grata. Fortunately he has good friends, and among them are three lively Witches: the daft, wifty yet strangely prescient Luna Lovegood, the scheming, fun-loving and irrepressible young Ginevra Weasley and the amazingly brainy and well-organized Hermione Granger. The three Witches have together cooked up a real cauldron-boiler of an idea: forming a troupe of Players, as yet Nameless, for the purpose of presenting theatricals to the Wizarding folk, to entertain and to distract. For the play's the thing, as the Bard once said, and the world is in need of some enjoyment.Please note that this is a very old fic and absolutely there are issues and I fully admit that it's not the most stellar thing I've ever written.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Lavender Brown/Neville Longbottom, Lucius Malfoy/Narcissa Black Malfoy, Luna Lovegood/Rolf Scamander, Neville Longbottom/Luna Lovegood, Requited - Relationship, Seamus Finnigan/Dean Thomas, Unrequited - Relationship
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	1. Intro/Orchestra

**2011 HD BigBang 'The Play's The Thing!' Intro**

**Author:** tigersilver

**Pairings and Main Characters:** Harry/Draco; Ron/Hermione; Dean/Seamus, Lucius/Narcissa, Luna/Neville/Rolf Scamander, Lavender (unrequited)/Neville

**Summary:** Harry Potter is _not_ happy with the life he's landed in. He's trained to be an Auror, was _invited_ to be one, but now he's considered too valuable—and too powerful—to be allowed out in the field. He faces a life of paperwork and filing, migraine headaches and the petty miseries of being a desk jockey. Draco Malfoy has just returned to his native England from Romania, where for a few years he worked his tail off at the Dragon Preserve. Now he requires a paying position and Malfoys are still somewhat _persona non grata_. Fortunately he has good friends, and among them are three lively Witches: the daft, wifty yet strangely prescient Luna Lovegood, the scheming, fun-loving and irrepressible young Ginevra Weasley and the amazingly brainy and well-organized Hermione Granger. The three Witches have together cooked up a real cauldron-boiler of an idea: forming a troupe of Players, as yet Nameless, for the purpose of presenting theatricals to the Wizarding folk, to entertain and to distract. For _the play's the thing_ , as the Bard once said, and the world is in need of some enjoyment.

**Rating:** NC-17

**Word Count:** 82,000

**Warnings:** Auror/Actor Harry, Actor/Ex-Dragon-Tamer Draco.

**Genre:** Humor, Romance, Smut, Fluff

**Canon:** Alternate Universe (Magical), EWE

**Betas/Beloved Advisors:** lonerofthepack, blueboyfey, demicus, altri_uccelli, phoenixacid, groolover.

**Notes:** This is essentially a play reflected in a play, reflected in a Mirror. Specifically, although the action progresses forward in a linear though episodic manner, both the prologue and epilogue pieces are set outside the main action. The main action occurs a few (two to four) years after the final battle at Hogwarts, in a chronological span. It is implied that the people who are deceased per canon remain deceased, but this is magical, this world. Stranger things have happened. Set in London, at the Ministry, Auror DepartmentHeadquarters, Harry's office; also at Malfoy Manor, in various rooms; at Harry's flat and at the Leaky Tavern in Diagon, and finally at the refurbished Odeon PlayHouse, Edinburgh. There are thus five sets. A number of scenes also take place before the closed curtains of the stage. Er…mentally. You, Reader, function as the archetypal Audience. Applause is always welcome. This **is** : A romantic comedy in four acts. With elements of _farce_. And _pathos_. And…(Merlin help us) _crack_.

Original inspiration & prompt was provided by vaysh11, ages ago, who wished to see a fic based on DanRad's vid 'This is Real'. After failing horribly at writing decent RP ficcage, the author finagled a way to attempt to incorporate the hilarity and energy of this video ('Broom burn!' 'Please! Put your pants back on!'), the utter drama of it, and in such a way as to protect the sacrosanct privacy of the actual **actors** , who've portrayed our beloved characters for a very long time. The author's many nods of respect are often sly and amused; this makes them no less sincere. Finally, please join the crew in a rousing acapella rendition of Archibald MacLeish's _Ars Poetica_ at the final curtain, in honour of all plays, playwrights, actors and their fellows, who provide us pure pleasure and a beautiful escape from our woes. All errors remaining are solely the author's, by the by. Forgive.

**Scene Setters:**  
Harry Potter Is Real  
AS YOU LIKE IT (Shakespeare)  
THE DOLLHOUSE (Henrik Ibsen)  
RHINOCEROS (Ionesco) & Pantomime/Commedia dell' arte/The Grey Mare & Twelfth Night  
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST (Oscar Wilde)

**Cast (in no particular order):**  
 **Harry Potter** … Hero, Auror, Lead Actor (Puck, and assorted roles), Lover  
 **Draco Malfoy** … Acting Coach, Ex-Dragon Tamer, Bon Vivant, Man-About-Town, Scion, Lead Actor ('Oberon' and assorted roles), Lover, 'Angel'  
 **Lucius Malfoy** … Father, Ex-Convict, Ex-Death Eater, Sometime Curmudgeon, Husband, Host, Adoptive Uncle, Director, 'Angel'  
 **Narcissa Malfoy** … Matriarch, Mother, Hostess, Trousers-Wearing-Society-Matron, Ex-Unexpected Heroine, 'Angel', Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Hermione Granger-Weasley** … Second Witch, Stage Manager, Business Manager, Booking Manager, Hormonal Mum-to-be, Wife, Friend, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Luna Lovegood** … First Witch, The Quibbler Staff-at-large, Actress, Available, Object of Desire, Free Elemental, Friend  
 **Neville Longbottom** … Hero, Crew, Props Purveyor, Object of Desire, Friend  
 **Pansy Parkinson** … Spoilt Princess, Fourth Witch (Adjunct), Society Gal, Co-Stage Manager, Gofer, PR Consultant, 'Angel', Friend, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Ginny Weasley** … Third Witch, Ex-Girlfriend, Girl-About-Town, Good Mate, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Blaise Zabini** … Actor, Crew, Friend, Businessman, 'Angel', Gossip, Sidekick  
 **Greg Goyle** … Actor, Crew, Friend, Sidekick, Proud Father, Businessman  
 **Greg Goyle's Wife** … Foreign, Proud Mother of One, Seamstress, 'Angel', Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Molly Weasley** … Matriarch, Mother of the Horde of Weasleys, Beloved Wife, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Arthur Weasley** … Patriarch, Ministry Employee, Friend, Father & Father-Figure, Not a Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **George Weasley** … Adoptive Brother, Proprietor of WWW, Friend, Sometime Actor, Crew, Set Design and Incidental Magics, Special Effects, Uncle  
 **Ron Weasley** … Auror, Nervous Husband, Lover, Friend, Father-to-be, Sidekick, Crew  
 **Seamus Finnigan-Thomas** … Auror, Husband, Lover, Friend, Crew, Sometime Actor, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Dean Finnigan-Thomas** … Auror, Husband, Lover, Artist, Scenery Painter, Sometime Actor, Friend  
 **Millicent Bulstrode** … Props, Costumes, Gofer, Special Effects, Incidental Crew & Cast, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Lavender Brown** … Head Costumes, Crew & Incidental Cast, Unrequited Lover, Nice Girl, Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Rolf Scamander** … Actor, Waiter, Unrequited Lover, Incidental Crew-cum-Theatre Consultant, Not a Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Kingsley Shacklebolt** … Audience, Friend, 'Angel', Fan of Gilderoy Lockhart  
 **Gilderoy Lockhart** … played by himself, Fan of Himself, Sometime Guest Director, Deposed  
 **Nameless Muggle Interviewer** … Fan of Harry Potter  
 **Assorted Aurors  
Assorted Stage Crew, The Nameless Troupe  
Assorted Diners, Extras and Milling Masses  
The Mirror of Erised **… Object of Dubious Magic, this mirror reflects a curious array of possibilities  
 **Lucius's Chair** … Object of Semi-Sentient Furniture, it has the personality of a large sight-hound and is quite loyal  
 **The Manor** … Ginormous Object of Sentient Domesticity, this house is actually a functional home and, like many a **real** home, it harbours its secrets.


	2. Pre-Prologue

PrePrologue. Circa 2002-2003. The Odeon Theatre, Edinburgh, Opening Night for the Nameless Troupe's production of Shakespeare's ' _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ '.

The curtains are closed currently and ushers are still seating the latecomers. We see familiar faces and figures: Kingsley Shacklebolt and his wife, the professors of Hogwarts, including Flitwick, Pomfrey, Hooch, Hagrid and of course McGonagall. Childhood and school friends are there, with their extended families; a smattering of red-cloaked Aurors rush in late as a straggly group, twittering excitedly. The Press is well represented, as well, by Rita Skeeter and Mr Lovegood and a wide-eyed staff reporter from Witch Weekly, amongst the many wizarding publications. A few Muggles are scattered about: Hermione's parents, Dudders Dursley (stuffed into a suit), and armed with his girlfriend Hannah Abbott, and various Squibs, including Harry's dear old nosy neighbour, Mrs Figg, who flourishes a playbill with great style.

The murmuring audience is greeted with an opulent theatre setting, circa the Gay Nineties. Gilt and scarlet abound. There are chandeliers and swags; there are cherubs in cornices. There are box seats and there are velvet ropes to keep them private. The seats are immensely comfortable and the crowd settles in with a collective sigh, clutching tumblers of various drinks and snacky, sticky finger foods—and of course, their playbills. Tiny figures dart about in the wizarding photos contained within—most notably one Harry Potter, who dashes off to Draco Malfoy's frame every other moment, chattering silently but excitedly. And some of the audience carry opera glasses atop carven folding sticks; a few of the exceptionally elderly present are laden with huge ear trumpets.

When the house lights blink thrice and then blip out, lowering abruptly, there's a barely contained 'whoosh!' of anticipation exhaled from everyone's lungs. It's to be a lengthy showing but no one seems to mind, particularly, not even the younger set, such as Teddy Lupin, accompanied by his redoubtable grandmother, Andromeda Tonks. There are few other children, though, and a wise Andromeda has come prepared with a censoring charm, for this play is really for adults only.

The curtains are closed tight, neatly swathed in ordered furls of fabric. They remain so, even when a single gel spot comes alive with blinding brilliance, focused upon a single figure, lounging by an ornate cast iron lamppost—the sort that requires gas or, rather, a lasting charm, to run.

It's the casual spin of the actor's wand that catches the eye at first: spin clockwise twenty, spin reverse ten, spin clockwise twenty—never-ending, the nervous motion draws the eye like lightning striking the heart of a plain.

Standing quietly at ease upon the stage is a young man, in his mid-to-early twenties, with very dark hair—black, actually—and not too long, with something of a style to it, but a bit ruffled, nonetheless. He is clad in a Muggle-style green t-shirt (sloganed in giant silver lettering 'Slytherins _Do_ Suck! Best House Ever!') and much-washed denims; he wears simple crepe-soled shoes and he's one hand sort of tucked into a front pocket on his jeans, as if it might slip out at any moment. His hips are cocked forward as he lounges back, shoulders balanced against the gaslight; he's very much at ease on this stage, apparently—as if he were born to tread its antique floorboards. And he's not a bad looking chap; no, not at all. Not tall, really, but not completely shrimpy, either, the young man gives off the air of being just a tad—a wee hint, this—of yet being slightly larger than life. He's a bit cute, and a bit fit, and he seems increasingly familiar to the waiting audience…who, as a group, grow increasingly perplexed by the youth's continued silence.

Why is it he says nothing? Aren't plays supposed to be all about the talking?

Oh, and there's a scar on his forehead but it's difficult to make out, being obscured by makeup and a few errant locks of his fringe.

The audience continues to await action; tension builds until it could be sliced and eaten with Marmite. They've been accustomed to expect declamation when presented with such staged moments. In this case, though, there's not a sign of that. With little else to do, they look more closely at the actor.

The most striking single characteristic of this possibly familiar young man is actually a lack. His eyes are _**not**_ green. Not emerald, not malachite, not viridian, nor olive, nor any shade that arises from the mixture of blue and yellow upon the colour wheel. This doesn't detract in any way from the loveliness of their gaze, their formation, and the set of them in his skull—his eyes are one of the young actor's best features, along with his air of spry energy and that seething, boundless interest he projects—nor does it in any way reduce the intensity of his expression. For all that he waits so casually, he's still quite visibly poised upon the brink of taking some momentous action. If this actor were to be an animal—or an Animagus—he'd be a bird or a feline, absolutely. It wouldn't surprise a single soul if he were to suddenly leap into the air or perhaps skitter sideways up the venerable curtains.

"Potter!"

Clearly, the _other_ young man—he who is rushing in from the wings in a pale-haired swooping flurry of limbs and traditional wizarding robes—seems to have drawn the same conclusion. "Potter, what in Merlin's name _are_ you up to?" he demands furiously. No—not angrily; merely impatiently, as though his fellow actor is patently known for this sort of thing—this 'being up to something'—and that's a given. A given, too, that he, this latecomer, of all the people in the world, must be kept first advised.

He's the taller of the two by perhaps two or three inches; enough so that that the first young man is forced to lift his chin to meet the newcomer's demanding gaze. The second gentleman is very familiar indeed. Everyone knows him, or of him, and they greet his entry with a collective intake of breath.

This one's as handsome as the devil and remarkably well dressed, in a rather unique manner. He wears a flapping robe over Muggle pleated trousers and shirt of elegant, expensive cut, and his grey eyes practically snap with brilliant impatience. He's blond, and it's a shade that is peculiar to only a few wizarding families. Unusual, if one will, in a world that is built solidly on the foundation of Odd.

"Potter!" he repeats, when the first young man only blinks at him, lips parted but issuing no sound. "Harry, I know you're on about _something_ , something likely very bloody irregular, too, so don't bother to rack your feeble excuse for a brain to come up with a fib for my sake," he warns. "I shan't believe a word you tell me anyway. So? _And_?" He taps a foot, impatiently. "Where _are_ you off to this fine day and what _are_ you about, Potter? Come _on_ —spill! I'm not having this secondhand!"

Potter—the first young man is most evidently Potter, _the_ Harry Potter; ( _and who is kidding whom and of course it is, dearie!_...or so some of the elderly members of the audience twitter giddily); and one of the famed personages the vast majority of the audience have queued up for ages and paid good Galleons to see in action—Potter grins up at his newly arrived companion. Clears his throat gently in a diminutive cough and shrugs a single cotton-outlined shoulder, all the while spinning that equally familiar wand of his—forwards, backwards, in little loops. Incessantly, and in an annoying fashion, considering the sizzling glare the blond man spares it.

"Stop that, Potter. It's annoying," Draco orders. "Now, tell me. What's up? What are you planning? Because you are—don't hide it."

"Er…nothing, really. Why?"

The blond man turns his glare from the irritating wand to a blandly innocent Potter-face. He hustles straight up to his shorter co-actor's toes and grabs at his t-shirt fiercely, crumpling it and pinning him up against the metal column of the lamppost quite firmly. But not quite hard enough to bruise, mind.

"You're up to no good, aren't you?" he demands in a rush, in a cultured voice that reeks of heavy suspicion. The lowering of blond-hued eyebrows only adds to it. He's a study in pale arrogance as he narrows his glassy, glittering eyes and quirks his fine manly lips in a practiced sneer. The audience murmurs; they've come to see this, just as much as they've come to see Harry. "I can tell; not an idiot, you know? Straight away; you're a bloody open book. Picture book, rather. Out with it. Tell me, then, and get it done and over with. You know I'll ferret it out of someone even if you don't. Mayhap your Weasel—he's worse than you at concealing shit."

It's a clear and obvious threat and Potter widens his not-green eyes in response, shifting back, as if to twist away from his attacker's insistence. But he doesn't manage that; the action's aborted, and he settles into Draco's hands just as casually as he leant up against the lamp previously. Some anonymous person in the audience giggles at the pronounced roll of his not-Potter eyeballs, quite loudly. And is promptly—loudly—shushed.

"Er?" Potter steadfastly maintains his air of injured innocence, even as he's all shifty-eyed and a little strange with it. There's a growing murmur of query as to why he's not quite as he should be; _is it a device?_ _A visual pun? These actors—they are always playing about!_ Or so the self-acclaimed critics amongst the seated mass ponder. "Ah. Why would you _ever_ think that, Draco?"

He bats his black lashes theatrically; he tilts his cleft chin charmingly…and now the audience can see clearly how the tall blond wizard leans urgently into Potter, shoving ever closer to his shorter person, as if drawn there by a huge magnetic force, and entirely unable to resist. Without a single word, Potter ceases any sign of any struggle, not that he's been. They continue to collide, the two bodies, and it's clear at least one of them is rather turned on.

There's a reason why one of the actor's godchild is suddenly blinking in confusion behind a magical censoring charm—this play is decidedly not for young children! To be certain he's distracted, his grandmum hands Teddy a small stash of playthings: an Auror action-figure, a miniature broom.

No… _both_. The staged sizzle is mutual. Potter's jeans are rather tight 'round his arse, for all their obvious age. They cling to his hips and thighs—it's clear Harry's no slouch when it comes to exercise. There's a giveaway bulge at the wrinkles of the crotch area, and the sharp-eyed have been waiting ages to spot it. When they do, a whisper (nearly breathless, like a rising heat wave off hot tarmac) spreads though the seated group like wildfire. A counter gasp of scandalous shock quickly follows.

There's a moment of pregnant silence, extended. One beat—one count of a thousand—two. Three.

Hips thrust, minutely, at first, irregularly, then sliding into an easy glide. They've met and matched many a time, or so the _Prophet_ tells its readers in nearly every Sunday's 'Heard About the Alley' column. Often there's pictures to accompany and that's a treat. More than one barely-of-age witch and wizard are in attendance solely because they consider the two actors to be incredibly, edibly appealing, physically. What they know of history could be slotted neatly into the circumference of the head of a pin, but no worries. Wizarding folk like their plays bawdy and this one promises to be so.

The wand in Potter's hand ceases its lazy spin gradually as two pairs of eyes—one a known grey, the other a rather unexpected light-blue shade, tinged with hazel—meet, cling and then converse volumes; not one single sound is audible from the stage—or elsewhere in the huge, echoing hall of the restored Odeon, other than the susurration of people breathing, as they carry on a silent dialogue the waiting audience can only imagine.

Before it drags on that last exquisite second too long, ruining the moment, the blond actor up on stage stomps a well-heeled foot nearly into the floorboards smartly, snorting.

"Bugger!" he exclaims. " _And_ bother! Fine, then—don't tell me, but then don't come crawling to me when the bloody Obliviators show up at our door, asking after you, Harry!"

"'Kay," Potter agrees equably, and only barely bites back a peeping, expanding grin. He's pleased and doesn't everyone know it now? They grin, too, most of them...and so does Draco, reluctantly. "I won't, then. So there."

He pokes the veriest tip of his pink tongue out, but only to moisten dry lips.

"Grrr!"

That provokes an instant growl and the blond man, positively identified as 'Draco', not that he wasn't well spotted from the very get-go, crowds Harry Potter straight up to the lamppost, practically squashing him betwixt and between.

"Dr—" the one called Potter begins, but he's not given the chance to continue. "Wait!"

Draco snogs Harry, his perfect teeth grinding and his jaw line flexing with frustration as he goes into it, and the muscles of his arms bunch creases in his shirt and over-robe as he yanks his companion that one last millimetre nearer yet. It's a matter of degree and how to ratchet it up, really. He seduces him easily enough; Harry's eager to respond in kind.

"—ulp!" Harry gurgles. His not-green eyes are rolling back in their sockets; Draco's grey ones are intense and lit up to a dazzling brilliance from within. "Ngh- _umm_!"

This initial physical moment is not so much defined as a decent snogging as it is a distinctly randy prelude to outright vertical shagging—in public—but neither participant seems to be particularly bothered by that. They're actors, first and foremost, and they're public figures—celebrities; and this isn't really so unusual that it should cause a scene.

The audience feels mostly smug; they're in on it all, having kept up with the dailies. This is candy, and dandy, and something they were hoping to see, albeit intense.

"Idiot!" Draco rejoins, pausing between devouring bites. "Be still, you!'

He makes it so, immobilizing Harry as best as he's able, but Harry's wiry, and Auror-trained. He's also very athletic—clearly, they both like that trait, as Draco is as well. It explains how they've nearly climbed into each other's pants, though.

"Mmm…" Potter groans, after another long wet moment. He squirms in Draco's arms, one denim-clad leg nudging upwards inexorably and clamped against a wool-trousered hip, rumpling the expensive robe. His t-shirt's rucked under his armpits from where Draco's dragged at it with fingertips; there's pinkening marks where Draco's manicured nails have dug in Harry's ribcage. Draco's jaw is damp and glistens in the spotlight; he swipes at it absently and dives straight back under.

The audience squirms as they drink all this in, as one, and some members begin to fan themselves furiously with their parchment programs. This is _not_ classical Shakespeare they're watching here—this is most definitely a scene lifted lock, stock and barrel out of some other play. Or perhaps a porno—and that's alright, really. Wizarding folk have a rather healthy respect for sex, the currency of Mother Earth.

"Oh….yes…yes!"

Harry moans, and he's not alone in that. Draco hisses and whimpers—or rather, emits small sounds of pleasure made faintly audible. It's the audience that's moaning louder than either of the actors, just a bit, and fidgeting a great deal more than they'd been when this herculean snog began. Knickers are likely growing damp with every passing second; certainly the temperature inside the magically cooled hall has risen sharply.

"Damn your eyes, Harry!"

Draco grinds out a nasty imprecation when he finally pulls back, though only just enough to allow his very willing captive to pant loudly, sucking in air through flaring nostrils and sighing it away with open mouth. Both concentrate on catching their breath for a moment, and then Draco swallows hard, long throat working, and pulls a face at his fellow actor, his mobile features visited with a long-suffering but not entirely displeased expression. He seems resigned, much as if Harry's spent the last few moments convincing him of the pros of some unspoken argument instead of kissing the daylights out of Draco in return.

"Oh?" He blinks, diverted. "And what did you do to them, anyway?" he asks, clearly as an aside. "They're all…funny."

He's greeted with a blank stare, slightly dazed, and proceeds to provide his fellow actor with a restorative jiggle.

"Your eyes? Not green? Those Muggly contacts, Harry, or just a spell?"

"Oh!" Potter's surprised, and then a bit shifty, glancing here and there with the eyes in question, not quite meeting the direct and searching stare of his companion. "Well. Yes. About that—y'see, I—well, I had an interview just now and—it was Muggle, and, ah—"

"Oh, don't bother," Draco sighs wearily. He presses a meditative, considering kiss to Harry's parted lips and draws back to regard him. Several members of the audience squeal, but it's not disruptive…or, not so much. "Tell me after, when you're through with whatever mischief it is you've managed. Promise, now."

Harry's eyebrows rise in silent question. He opens his swollen lips as if to protest, but Draco shakes his head wearily.

"No, no! it's not that I'm not curious, either. It's only 'cause I don't think I can stand to hear anything else upsetting at this very moment. All Hades has broken loose at home. You know how Father is."

Harry hesitates—and then nods, finally, with the tiniest of sympathetic smirks.

It's clear that a confession—later, after whatever it is Harry's up to is fully over with and past history—will come easily enough, just by the way Potter's face creases into a giant, overwhelmingly friendly grin. He's alight once more, a torch of mischievous spirit, burning sulphur-brilliant in the cage of his lover's arms, and he's apparently more than willing to cooperate with Draco…just, not right at this particular moment. But Draco seems to realize this, too, and there's no tension. His bout of quick impatience is blown over, and both are left only to indulge in a bit of heavy petting.

The audience fans itself meanwhile furiously with the playbills and there's quite a bit of quaffing of chilled beverages. It's a heated few moments, up there on stage.

Which they're clearly enjoying, too—the actors, that is.

The audience sighs blissfully. It's rather nice when two people rub along. 'Course, rubbing creates sparks, but then it's all about drama, isn't it—a play? A few chuckle appreciatively, as well. Likely they've been there, done that, and know the nuances of a spot of dirty dancing (politely known as 'compromise') very well.

"Promise, then," Harry replies eventually, and there's a hint of steel to it, and the clear implication he'll be following through, come what may. "You'll listen quietly the whole way through without flipping your lid, Draco."

"Bloody hell," Draco sighs, with one last long contemplative look at the gamine face upturned to his. "And bugger all, while we're at it, but you're a handful, too, mate." He sighs again, making a production of it. "Bugger _this_. What have I ever done to deserve it?" he casts his eyes up to some invisible _deus ex machina_ , but then instantly gives it up as a bad show. "Well? Kiss me, then," he orders, frowning. "Want another before you go rushing off. And yes, of course—I'll listen. What d'you take me for?"

"Mmm."

Harry goes up on tiptoe, hands firmly curled about Draco's shoulders, and does as commanded, ever so gently, like a benefice or a blessing, squarely on the firm damp of Draco's lips. Then the corners, and then the length of throat below.

"I'll take you," Harry purrs, "and gladly."

Draco's eyes close ever so slowly, the pale lids heavy, and he's enspelled. Visibly.

"Love you," Harry whispers. Closes his eyes as well as he slides his open mouth deliberately down the length of Draco's front, trailing lips across every part of his chest and abdomen, thighs and one very faintly dark stubbled cheek in contact. His knees bend and bow as he crouches; spring taut as he rises back up. "Love you," he says again, and Draco's face is both twisted and slack, falling into an expression of pleased wonder…which then segues just as quickly into outright pleasure—with a distinct flavour of Malfoy assurance. "Love you…"

The audience—the ones that aren't still gasping over the implications of Harry's tongue's languorous visit to various exposed bits of Draco Malfoy—is grinning right along with him. It's a quiet little party, this; a festive event, even if it's all removed a pace away from them by the shield of the stage.

Because they are _acting_ , are they not?

"…Likewise."

Mayhap it's not just 'acting' but that Muggly Method Acting the audience is seeing; a newfangled way of going about it, yes—but, oh, so effective!

The audience is deathly silent as the final echo of that deep croak fades away, muffled by swags of velvet and dense theatre carpeting. As is Draco, as he returns Potter's kiss with the precision of a professional ballet dancer, but then clearly he requires no carefully rehearsed dialogue to express what's bubbling up, as if from an overflowing cauldron, from his quite probably just as elegant interior. It's all inherent in his face, in the curve of his spine, in his revealed nape as he bends closer to strew touch and desire and love-in-action baby kisses over the willing planes of cheekbone and brow. Scarred brow. That, at least, like the hair, remains very recognizable.

It's time for action—no more words are needed. Nor wanted, either.

It's contained within Draco's hands, where they clutch, as it is in the pads of Harry's curiously delicate, lingering fingertips, curling and grasping, feather-light and determinedly clasping as a kitten's claws. It's evident in shared stance and symbiotic body language and stagey business and not even the faint swell of the unseen orchestra's opening music detracts nor adds to the ambient cloud of emotion, caught up between two actors—two people—poised upon one bare square of stage space, trompling toetips in their treacle-slow haste to climb into one another. Farther, deeper, _in_.

The kiss the magically bright gel spot highlights—and then dissolves ever so slowly away from, till the curtain is cloaked in darkness and the audience is left blinking, struggling to adjust their many eyes—is long and tender and infinitely slow. And time on stage is an exaggerated element in any case: each moment could be a span of hours, theatrically. The memory of it, just post, is reminiscent of butterflies dancing through the air as they mate—fragile like that, and as ethereally airy. It is so refulgent with sincerity, the emotion is nearly palpable, as if it could drip from the two actors, were it corporeal, and flood over the footlights. And lastly, it is passionate. Restrained, perhaps, but passionate as life itself is, telescoped into one small series of everyday actions.

It's a kiss, a snog: nothing more, nothing less. Was a kiss. It could mean anything, imply many things, and it is wide open to interpretation…therein lies the beauty of it.

When the house lights come up again, very briefly but bright as noon's brilliance, the two actors and the lamppost have vanished as if they never were. Without a pause, there begins a second series of timed blips to indicate the start of the _real_ action—the play they've all come for, this nameless sea of viewers…and it's as though everyone awakes from a particularly pleasant daydream. They blink blown-wide pupils and they shift, juggling tumblers and cartons of popped corn, waxed paper-wrapped sweets, chocolate-covered nuts and dried fruits, frogs, malted balls and fiddly serviettes, playbills—their own belongings, too. Shifting to find a comfy state for the long haul, shuffling feet, settling in for a second time, this.

And too, the couples present adjust how they sit, leaning that scant smidge nearer one another, pressing the smooth slopes of shoulders. Strangers exchange knowing glances, and not a few fair number of the audience is a bit flushed about the edges and slipping fingers 'neath suddenly tight robes' collars.

For they've played witness to—nay, they've been drawn into—a private moment, and it was quite incredibly real. No faux theatrics, no false noses—no makeup nor costuming, and barely a single prop. Not much of a meaningful dialogue, either.

But no matter. Let it pass. It's not important, now. The real play's yet to come, after all. It was just…rather spiffing to have it so prefaced, that's all. A reminder of what's truly important…

…For who has _not_ kissed, _not_ touched, in such a way as to give love? To receive love, in reply? And who, amongst the audience, who is there who has _not_ wished nor dreamt of such things, such moments, fleeting, fondly, sweetly, and allowed the light inherent to open up all sorts of dark inner spaces? The closets of the mind, aired out and filled with cleansing light—the joyously simple spell of 'Lumos!', nearly always the first ever learnt by a wizard.

The play's the _thing_ , really. Gifts intangible are contained within: light and sound and action, brought together in one place, intersecting—shared.

_The play's the thing._


	3. Prologue

_**Actual**_ Prologue: 'This _is_ Real'. Circa 2008-2009, Wiltshire, Malfoy Manor. Draco & Harry's Suite, the Parlour.

Hermione Weasley, Stage Manager, Business Manager, all 'round captain of the very small Industry that was wizarding play production, was admittedly a tad bit tipsy. The icy-cold glass the house-elves had spelled to magically refill was a slender fountain well of cheer in her hot little palm as she wove her way through corridors; the endlessly intriguing rooms of Malfoy Manor were ever more fascinating when one was breezy sheets to the wind and feeling rather pleasantly floppy amidst the gentle zephyrs.

She'd discovered alcohol was extremely useful when attempting to drown out the echoes of her own remembered screams. Malfoy Mansion had not always been so benign as it was this particular evening. But that was years ago, yes, and Draco—though a bit of a twat occasionally—was no threat to her. Gods, no! Draco was a bloody angel, rather—as were dear old pesky Lucius and the rather delightful Narcissa. Too, she rather had to be present and presiding: it was the post-season fete for the cast and crew and she'd been one of the primary coordinators, as always. Hermione: near-resident Minerva of the Manor.

But alcohol did mitigate unwanted memory…and the Manor was really quite beautiful, in purpose and execution. And _huge_ —she'd been walking about it for quite fifteen minutes and hadn't seen the same rooms twice!

Some rooms, of course, were mutable…as were their contents and furnishings.

The one she at last fetched up in (after a Cook's tour of the kitchens, the scullery, the three 'best' receiving parlours and the various games rooms, all four of them), was cozy and comfy. She wandered in on a lurching whim, tacking gently left and right in her inebriated stroll, and came upon an enormous divan, quite the size of a small country. Overstuffed and capacious, it was done up in a charming shade of dark burgundy suede. It begged one to lounge upon it, that divan. It positively reeked of comfort.

Startlingly enough—or not, as he'd disappeared from the madding crowds some time previously—it already contained one Draco Malfoy and he was in the midst of laughing his well-bred arse off, pointing at the Muggle plasma telly stuck on the wall and gasping with not very well stifled well-bred mirth. Draco was of course a regular chap but he still had his airs and graces about him, despite Harry's perpetual motion of ' rubbing off' on him.

"Hurrr!" Draco choked on both his bubbly and his own giggles, practically falling over where he sat. "Tha'—tha' _idiot_!"

No airs at the moment, though: his patrician pale face was pink with drink and wreathed with lines of pleasure; he seemed to be quite overtaken with what went on in the Muggle box, and hilariously so.

_She'd_ thought he was with the others, in the South Wing Ballroom dancing the night away, but apparently not. But then Harry was known to be belayed at the Ministry in a last minute meeting with Kingsley, so it made sense, rather, that Draco had withdrawn from his duty to company for a few minutes. Draco was always at a bit of a loose end when caught without a Harry about him…it was rather sweet, that. And of course Luna, Gin and Mrs Malfoy were more than capable of hosting in his absence. Even the poker-up-his-arse senior Malfoy was on stage, circulating genially. If his bloody Chair mashed a few Muggle-born feet, oh well—that hardly mattered. His larders and cellars were still wide open to all the gathered Troupers.

"Her'what, M'foy?" Hermione inquired genially, happy to horn in on whatever it was that had Draco reduced to literal tears of laughter. She jabbed his loosened collar in a matey fashion. 'S'gong'onnn?"

"Him!" Draco pointed, his fingertip wavering before Hermione's slightly fuzzy field of vision. He reeled back a short distance to blink up at her. "'E's a little blighter. S'Harry, 'Ermione. See?"

"Ooooaaah?" Hermione did not hide her bewilderment well when on the sauce; her mouth dropped open. She had another glug from the magical glass to fill it. "Is?"

"Him!" Draco seemed agitated. "The idjit! Look'a 'im. He's fucking about to do a Wronski off that bloody sofa! See 'im? No—wait, hang on. What—his pants? What's the little wanker up to, now?"  
"Nrrh?"

Hermione turned to her gaze full on the screen of the busy telly, plopping genteelly (except for the slight starboard list) onto the plump cushion by Draco's slouched body. She promptly leaned into his arm and snuggled up, feeling vastly friendly and just chock-full of good will.

After all, Draco was oh, _so_ handsome to gaze upon and fit besides, plus he made Harry a happy camper… _and_ caused Hermione to laugh aloud more often than not, even here. He was clever— _she_ was clever. He was the only other person she knew of—excepting Headmistress McGonagall—who'd actually read Hogwarts, A History from cover to cover. And liked it. And finally—because three was a magical number; well four, maybe; that worked too—she could relate quite nicely to Draco's rather decidedly anal nature. He was actually so very on top of every detail he'd taken to actively convincing people he wasn't, not at all—that he was a free spirit, like Harry. In fact, it was really an act, but an ongoing one. And Hermione could relate. They were of a kind, peas in a pod, she and Draco. And she'd developed a certain….fondness…for his pure-blood person, rather. Also—lastly—my, but there were any number of reasons for matiness, weren't there? His choice in furnishings was absolutely divine: the divan was the most comfortable she'd ever collapsed upon, bar none. This being his and Harry's withdrawing room she'd fallen into.

"Meh?" she asked, attempting to raise both her eyebrows and her glass in a friendly fashion, indicating interest. "'Arry, you mean? That 'im, Draco? Looks like 'im."

She pointed a free pinkie finger at the plasma telly. It was a bit difficult to make out 'xactly what was going on in its frame. The brunet bloke—seemed very familiar, him—was babbling on at a mile a minute and bashing his hands 'round all the while—just as Harry would. About Quidditch—just as Harry would. He was a bore about Quidditch, Harry. And off screen was a voice, a very BBC narrator's Voice, who seemed to be prompting the energetic young man by asking question after question. And then begging him not to shed his pants—of all things!

If she strained her bleary eyes and cocked her ears at just the proper angle, Hermione could make out a phrase or two in the continuous jibber-jabber: something about _reality_ and _Quidditch_ and mayhap _footie_ and…well, the remainder was lost in translation. And something about how Harry had realized he was Harry somewhere in the Fourth Book—whatever that was—which was puzzling, but not that important.

'Cept that the chap who was familiar was insistent that it was _real_. Whatever it was, it was **REAL**. This, Hermione did indeed take in, even though the haze of cumulative layers of chardonnay.

She turned a wobbly chin toward her seatmate, silently enquiring.

"See?" Draco demanded, waving a wild arm in the direction of the telly screen, where Harry (was that Harry? Looked like Harry, didn't it though? But _not_ , either) was zooming about, leaping on and off a much smaller divan done up in a lighter fabric. Yakkiing it up, too, to some invisible man or t'other. "See 'im?" Draco was quite energetic with the one hand, whacking it about heddlessly. "He's a barmy sod, this one. Talks to bloody anyone, 'Arry does. Me, Dad—the elves. Muggles. Centaurs, even. S'why'I'love'im….Tha'. 'E's no clue. Not a single one. Plee—plebian!"

"Whazza'?" Hermione wasn't following. "'Arry is?"

"Friendly chap. 'Arry." Draco nodded wisely. "Likes people. Odd, tha'." He tipped his tumbler in the direction of the chap on the telly. "More power, eh? Need it, yeah. Them."

"Hum?" Hermione watched as the chap in the telly jumped about and began bounding around the smallish room he was inhabiting. Still no view of the Narrator, though. For Hermione had still no clue as to why Draco was transfixed by his telly when there was a full-blown rollick of a cast party taking place in his ancestral pile. "Nn?"

"S'nterview," Draco grunted, engaging the speaking hand in a new species of wave: a sideways flop of sorts-Merlin knew what that meant, Hermione wondered. Distaste, maybe? He didn't like the chap on the telly? For he certainly liked Harry…but that wasn't Harry, though he did seem awfully familiar, even when one was…feeling a bit feeble-minded. "Press, Granger. Pub-publicity!"

Her mate took a messy slurp of his drink, sloshing a spray over Hermione's hairdo. He never normally sloshed, so he was likely somewhere near the same tranquil plane upon which Hermione existed. This pleased her; everyone should feel as good as she did at the moment.

"Looks like it. You know? Back and forth, back and forth, like badminton?" That made no sense at all to Hermione, but hey, _whatever_. It _was_ a party.

"Ah." She nodded wisely, peering at the telly again. Oh! _Now_ she understood. The man who reminded her—strongly—of her mate Harry was talking with the Muggle Press man. Was the off-screen Announcer's voice she was hearing, over and over, as well as maybe-Harry, for Draco seemed to have the whole episode on some sort of continual replay. Sort of patronizing, actually—that Voice…Hermione rather wished the Harry _-not_ Harry man would hex him.

'Cept that wasn't Harry…er, was it? That was a Muggle man, wearing Muggly clothes, and regular old Muggles didn't go about hexing people; they _couldn't_.

…Unless they weren't Muggles at all. This thought set Hermione to bleary pondering. And that could indeed be Harry. Harry was an actor. Harry could also be on Muggle telly, because of the Muggle magic of pre-recording. Though Harry was here, in the Manor, with Draco and with all of them, or would be soon enough—technically—when he was done with his last-minute meeting…which is where he would have been in any event if he were in the Manor anywhere—with _Draco_. Because they two were perpetually joined at the hip and really very bilious-making, they were so in love. And Draco always kept tabs on Harry. Like the sun rising, he did this. Harry let him, too. Liked it.

Ron—good old Ron; lovely Ron—had remarked upon it often enough. "Hermione," he'd say, "I'm bilious. They're canoodling again, the two of them. Make them find a room, please. Rosie's too young to see this."

Hermione nodded happily, wobbly-headed. She agreed with herself, as she so often did, about this point at least. Whatever it was, it was _it_ , then. Settled. This _was_ Harry, right there on the telly, which was why Draco was bothering at all, watching Muggle telly in the midst of a Troupe party.

"Silly 'Arry—he's been talking to the Muggles again," Draco scowled faintly, unknowingly confirming Hermione's suspicions. "Spillin' shit they'll never understan', poor sods. Too, too gregarious for 'is own good, 'Arry. Likes to talk; hear his own voice. Gryffindor thing, that. Still…love 'im _still_ —love 'im!"

"'Kay…eh?" Hermione perked up at that; Draco was _so_ insistent, she ceased her mindless nodding. "Huh? Wotcher mean, Dra—" she hiccoughed mid-way through—"cooo? Why would he?"

What, Hermione wondered, was all this about Harry and the Muggles? She didn't know a single iota about it—which meant it must be Luna or Gin's idea, having Muggles in on it.

It? Was there an actual 'it'?

Hermione pursed her lips. The girls were heinous, really—always pranking, always up to some nutjob scheme. Pansy, too. For bloody PR. And Luna was completely round the twist, as always. Be just like her to send Harry off to talk to the Muggles, thinking it was a good lark. Or a research project…or some such. Attention, though. People must be made to pay attention.

Draco licked his lips and cocked his chin. "Alrighty there, Hermie? 'Cause I said tha' jus' now. You hearing me, girl? Ears alright?"

Hermione had to admit—muzzily—she wasn't for it. No Muggle bashing—and positively no Mudblood- mentioning. 'Twas verboten. No good—not copacetic. Harry, fr'instance, was half-Muggle and she was _all_ Muggle and where the fuck did Draco M'foy get off, pointing fingers at anyone anyway?

She glowered at his upper arm, sulkily, abruptly irked for no reason. Poked it hard with a buffed fingernail for good measure. Thought momentarily about biting down upon it hard enough to leave toothmarks, as Rosie did when she was feeling her mustard.

"'Ate you, M'foy," she growled, making that emotion clearly known. "Stick up your arse." Explaining it. Whatever.

"What, what?" Draco eyed her carefully. He seemed bewildered. "What're you on abou', Hermie? It's 'Arry—are you even awake, Hermie?"

"You prick, Draco M'foy!" Hermione spat out, incensed. By gawds, but whatever was in those Collinses was incendiary! "Mudbloody, my eye!"

"Whoa!" Draco flung a hand up, stopping her. "Not Mudbloods, Hermie. Dirty word—know that. Told Father, too. Keep his trap shut, told 'im. Better do, too. Hex his pants off—oh, ick! Baaaad image." Draco swallowed hard, looking faintly greenish. "Er…why're you bringing that up, now?"

"Ah." Hermione accepted that response fairly easily. She'd experienced a definite qualm, thinking Draco was back to his bad old ways, but this was alright—he wasn't. Just a misunderstanding then. "H'okay, then. Thass'alright."

"Good, good," Draco nodded, pleased, and settled back against the cushy squabs of the couch. There was a brief silence on their part and then he sighed dramatically.

"Yesh." Hermione blinked at him, curious. "Yesh?"

"Him, though—Harry. Potter. Never ge'it, thass'all. Dunderhead, dense, thick—all tha'."

Draco inhaled the last of his champagne, a whole series of expressions flickering across his narrow features. He slipped a matey arm about Hermione to keep her mostly upright, as she was nearly horizontal…and very sleepy.

"Oi!" Hermione objected. She was upright, she was sure of it—it was the world that had tilted, sod the silly thing. "Wotcher?' She didn't need no stinking help staying upright, at least, even if the sofa was very plush and cushy. "Bugger off. M'okay!"

Her seatmate treated her to a stare down the Malfoy nose.

"Merlin! Bellicose, aren't you? Fiece l'il thing."

"Grr!" Hermione growled, both liking that—and not. "Shaddup, M'foy! Stop shaking me!"

"Right, right, wha'ever you say, Hermie," her friend drawled, blinking slowly and taking care to steady her glass for her. Being a seasoned Trouper, he blithely ignored the jab to the ribs that resulted from Hermione's flash of temper and only snickered beatifically when she glared at him: the sound of a happy, happy soul; one happy to be puzzled by the actions of a beloved other; one happy to be a bit foozled by the bubbly, as well. And when he continued to grin at her like some barmy mental patient, Hermione echoed it, all about bonhomie abruptly. She did feel quite nice, really—when the world stayed upright, that was.

"Harry's mental, see?" Draco was talking at her. "For a wizard. Poor Muggly man doesn' stand a chance, really. Never, ever sort the prick—'e's fuckin' confusin'. Talks too fast, says silly shit. Love tha' 'bout 'im."

"Erm?" Hermione blinked. Oh, right, right—it was the subject of Harry, again. All Draco ever really talked about, Harry. "…You do?" 'Course, it required a rather special person to understand the 'specialness' of Harry; they were rare birds, the ones who did. But then it was logical, wasn't it?

"'E's a'numdum," Draco went on. "A proper poozle, 'Arry is." Draco nodded assuredly, as if of the opinion all was now made crystal clear. "Puddle, I mean. What'sit—crossword thingamabob. Righ'."

"Poozle?" New word, Hermione's soggy brain noted, and not one she knew of. _Poodle_? No— _that_ couldn't be right. Harry was no curly French hound with poufy bits at his knees and doggy elbows. _Puddle_? Not likely, either. Er… _muddle_?

"D'you mean 'puzzle', Drac—" She hiccoughed a second time, loudly and unexpectedly, only barely managing to politely cover her mouth with a wayward palm. "Ah! Oh? Oops!"

Draco nodded, all dazzling ice-grey eyes and air of earnestness. "Puzzle, puzzle, puzzle." He grinned brilliantly at the telly screen and the small Harry, sparing Hermione a fast hug 'round her slim shoulders. "Love tha'. Love 'im so much, makes me crazy. Love that 'ee makes me crazy, too. Sod. Weird. Odd fellow. Yannow?"

"Ah," Hermione nodded. She did, yes. "Yesss," she agreed, verbally. "'Ee'is, yesh. _That_."

"Look at 'im go," Draco remarked proudly. "Told me to watch. Said I'd laugh, yeah?"

"Yeah?" Hermione echoed, not really listening. "'Kay."

Yes, Harry was odd. Had always been, in a special-like way. She agreed with that. She was very sleepy, too, all the sudden. Draco was warm and cozy and the divan cushions were quite soft. She could have a little nap, she decided, closing her eyes now that the mystery was solved. It was alright; Draco was merely pointing out Harry's unusual aspects. No problem there.

But Draco, now that he'd landed a companion in his convivial solitude, was eager to talk—at length, just like the little Harry-not-Harry-person was doing on the telly screen. That bloke looked a great deal like the Harry Potter Hermione had known for forever. Though…excepting his eye colour, of course, and the lack of scar, and perhaps her friend Harry wasn't quite so frenetic as this chap was, but he could be, certainly. Then there was the Mugglish air to the room about him—hotel room? Flat? What was Harry doing in some strange flat?

"Eh?" She attempted to zero in on the chap's face; get a better gander at him.

"What?" Draco pinched her. "He's good, yeah?"

"Mmm."

Hermione's brow crinkled in her own sort of puzzlement: was that Harry, maybe under a Glamour, or wasn't it? The young man resembled no one more than that actor who'd played Harry's part in those immensely popular cinema shows, but…all the same, er, what?

"'S'like I never really knew 'im," Draco had started up again and was speaking somewhat meditatively, jiggling his ice in his drink for emphasis, one weather eye fixed on the screen. "All that time, never, ever. Know what I mean, Hermie?"

"Don' call me tha'," Hermione reproved him sleepily, blinking. This was all a bit much for an exhausted, snockered Manager Extraordinaire to take in. Even on a good day—a normal day—Hermione would be a bit shocked to see her best mate appearing on Muggle telly. But—no one addressed her by any horrid diminutives—not even Ron. It was imperative that Draco be corrected immediately; he'd any number of bad habits, Malfoy.

"'M'not Hermie," she announced, struggling to sit up straight and spilling her drink. "'M'Huuurr-my-own-neee! Say it!"

"'Kay. Her-mi-on-eee," Draco repeated dutifully, frowning. He was a bit bloodshot, but not in an unattractive way. They were all a bit red-rimmed, the lot of them, after four gruelling months on the local theatre circuit. And their own Odeon…lovely, lovely Odeon, courtesy on of Draco's bad habits, thanks ever so. Berk could spend some Galleons, couldn't he?

Draco huffed gently, after a countable moment. He upped one of his famous eyebrows.

"Thass' too long to say, you know? Sure you don' want something shorter? I mean, Granger's nice and all. Can say that—used to saying that, really. Graaaan-ger. Granger!"

Hermione shook her head emphatically. She'd kept the Granger, of course, but after all those years of name-calling on the part of this blond pain-in-the-arse, the only name Hermione would readily accept from him was her given. F'real. And it had better be perfect and uncut, so help her Merlin, or Draco would feel the wrath of a few of her more arcane stinging hexes on his fit arse, Harry's honeybunny sweetie-pie or no. Hermione was _not_ having Draco Malfoy butcher her name!

"Her-my-own-nee," she re-stated, enunciating, in case the arse planned on claiming exemption due to inebriation. "Say it! Repeat it after me, Draco—right now!" Bloody amazing, how passion could clear the head!

Draco merely shrugged, but amiably. He seemed mildly bewildered by her but willing enough.

"'Kay, Her-my-on-neee. Tha' alrigh'?"

Hermione allowed that it was by nodding. Her head was beginning to ache slightly. She was thirsty.

"Bu' anyway, 'bout 'Arry?" he asked, hopefully, after a beat, "'cause I wanna tell you. Can I tell you? Her-mi-on-nee?"

"Hhhm-hmm." Hermione hummed her willingness, closing her eyes again in satisfaction. "Mmmm," she agreed. Perhaps someone would come and bring her a glass of water and some painkillers. That would be pleasant. "Tired…"

"'Kay; go to sleep, then. So…er, he's mine, you know? Harry?" Draco was taking extra care to pronounce his aitches; he'd dropped any number so far, likely due to his happily soused state. "Mine-mine-mine."

"Uh…huh."

"Took me a while, thass' state of affairs," Draco confided, nudging Hermione's ribcage gently with a spare elbow. "Hah! State of affairs! Funny! Made a joke, Her-my-own-nee—isn' it funny?"

"Mmm."

"Struggle, um..." Draco tapped his fingers on her arm, gently. It tickled but was pleasant. She smiled sleepily. "Was…is. Differen'. Differen' as two peas, yeah? Inna pod." He flung a hand out, gesturing grandly to everything Malfoy. "Great huge pod, eh?"

"Mmm."

"You really lissening, Her-mi-on-nee?" He peered at her, the frown returning. "'Cause, pardon me, but I don't think you are…really. Wanna a Pepper-Up?"

Hermione nodded vaguely. Then she shook her head. She was worn to the bone but the sound of Draco's voice was nice; it felt like a bedtime story being told to her, same as she would tell her daughter. Not one she'd tell Rosie, mind, due to the naughty bits, but nice all the same.

"Uh-huh. No."

"Right, right." Draco seemed satisfied because he continued. "Won't then—jus' sleep. Anyway, but I bagged 'im, fin'ly." Draco sounded very pleased with that. "S'mine now. Mental, but all mine. M'appy. Proud o'mysel'. You get that, Hermie?"

"Nnnh." She did, yes. What of it? Evreybody got that. "Uh-huh."

"You've got your Weasel, right? Snagged 'him, not like it was hard or anything. 'S'like it took aaages, yeah, but it was worth it, Hermie, right? You 'appy?" Draco carried on, his voice soft with remembrances. "M'appy. Want _you_ to be happy, too, Hermie. Like me, yannow? You're alrigh', for a girl….sometimes."

Hermione's head nearly tumbled off with her nodding: yes, she was happy. For a girl. Happy to be with Ron, happy to have Rosie, happy to know Harry was happy, happy to curl up on this so comfy sofa and listen to Draco Malfoy tell her a sodding neverending love story.

"'M'appy, too." Gods, but the git was repetitive sometimes. "All worth it—he's mine, you know? Mine!" The quiet musings abruptly resolved to ferocity; Draco sat bolt upright and waved his glass fiercely at the telly, where the little Harry was once again threatening the Muggle Interviewer with yanking his pants down. Hermione giggled. "Mine, mine, mine!"

"Urp! Okay, already! Stop tha'!" Hermione gasped, thrown into a graceless heap when the divan picked up on Draco's momentum and sent a rolling wave through the cushions. She squirmed, fighting velveteen-clad sofa stuffing—the cushions were indeed goose down and seemed intent on sucking her in. "Ah-ah-ah! Prat! A little 'elp 'ere!"

"Oh, sorry!" Draco fell back against the squabs and righted her along the way, chuckling as he hauled her upright. The flash of temper was gone as soon as it happened. "Sorry, sorry. Wasn't thinking clearly—din' mean to do that. Alright there, Hermie?"

"Um. You know?"

She nodded gallantly, though the room still swam a bit before her dazzled eyes. On the telly the small Harry lookalike was still bouncing and bounding.

"Yeah?"

"Shaddup now. Sleepy."

"'Kay. Good-oh. Is juss' e's mine," Draco reasserted firmly. "Want everyone to know, yeah? Tha' ee's mine. My 'Arry," Draco banged the couch arm all the sudden, beating it for no reason. "Silly sod, but mine. Took me bloody long enough, what?"

"Mmm," Hermione rubbed her belly; the magical Collins was still sloshing. "Erm. Ah." She belched, but subsided when Draco fluttered a soothing hand at her middle. "Ooooh-urgh!"

"Placidus," he said, and smiled brilliantly at her relieved features. M'fay had always excelled at Wandless. "Better, yeah?" he asked her, winking. "'S'new Charm. Faster 'n Sobrietus; more effective than a Sobering Draught. Keeps the buzz goin', and no mess after. Patented it, jus' yesterday. Like tha', d'you?"

"Yes!" Hermione was quite pleased; all her intestines checked in perfectly well and her headache was gone. "I love you, Draaacooo!"

"Er...thanks." Draco eyed her doubtfully. "Super." He edged away abruptly, stuffing cushions against her side thoughtfully as he went. "I'll, we—I'll just sit over here…now."

Hermione wasn't known for her excess of girly silliness—not like Lavender was, for instance. But…still, she was at once overwhelmed by a great sodding brilliant wave of gratitude: to be here, in this lovely, lovely house, attending this lovely, lovely party, in company with Draco and Harry and all her friends. To be successful, in that the show had been a humungous hit on their first night. And substantially better off, as the take had been copious: all the wizarding world adored the Nameless Players, it appeared—even the critics. To be happy, knowing Ron was off toddling somewhere about, likely just as shit-faced drunk as she, boring the arse off some other poor soul 'bout the Cannons, and little Rosie was safe with Molly or maybe Lucius (oh Merlin! The irony!) and she? _She_ could take a mental load off and be utterly wasted.

"Love ya!" Hermione bellowed enthusiastically, bussing his smooth-shaven cheek. "Love ya, mate." She petted him fondly, what she could reach. She pointed to the screen. "Love ya, Harry. He loves you, too, Drakey—yannow tha', righ'?"

'Cause she did. _He_ did. He loved Harry, didn't he? And he was a funny old git and clever. Like her. Yes.

No—no problems in Hermione's world. Not a single blessed one. For once there was no stress, no wankers in the wings, no headaches in the making—no schedules, budgets or theatrically inclined people making scenes in her office off the Ballroom. Just good friends—happy friends—and a big fucking party to enjoy in a big friggin' mansion in great huge frigging Wiltshire. _And_ Draco Malfoy, beaming at his horribly dear Muggle plasma telly like a silly sod, yakking it up about how much he loved Harry.

Life was remarkably good, actually; Hermione grinned at her kneecap companionably.

"S'beautiful, yeah? You should see 'im in the mornings, Hermie," Draco murmured on without cease, apparently under the impression Hermione hung on his every word. "His bloody hair? Sticks up every which way. And no specs to mar that pretty face of his," Draco nodded to himself. "Doesn't even realize it, how good he looks without 'em. Doesn't believe me when I tell 'im. Says I make it up, to tease 'im. Can you imagine? Herm? Can you?"

"No—no," Hermione mumbled, settling in again and nearly fully re-entered into her cozy doze state; all the while, the little telly wizard jabbered on about…Quidditch again, was it? Broom burn?

"Can't imagine."

Must be. Broom burn, he'd just said, his little telly voice squeaking from the wall. But Draco mumbled and mumbled, sighing like some lovesick dolt over the Harry-inna-box. He's budged over again and busily squeezing the life out of Hermione's shoulders.

"Er…what?" she muttered, hearing Draco's voice fade away in the far distance. "Hmm?"

"Difficult prick, he can be," Draco asserted, his chest rumbling under Hermione's ear. "Bloody well blinkered. Thought he was straight. Thought he was an Auror. Thought he was…was…well. Took me ages. Eons, Hermie. Thought I'd die of fuss-fuss-frus-tray-shun."

"Hmm?"

"To convince 'im. Thass' wha'. Git."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. He's a shit, a dumb one, for all 'e's so all Auror this and Auror that and whatnot special trainin'. Blind as a 'B'livian cave bat—yannow? Those no-eyed ones with the speckles on their snouts? Lovegood was sayin'…" At Hermione's nod, he continued. "Bloody wilful, too, daft bugger. Doesn' listen to me when I tell 'im he's gorgeous."

"Yeah." Hermione could relate. "Yesh. S'true. Never listens, 'Arry. Git."

"Must'a told 'im a million times over, too," Draco continued; seemed he'd never shut up, either. "Every which way I could think of. Bloody Mirror told 'im—but did _'e_ listen? No! _No_ , he did not!"

"Git," Hermione nodded sagely. "Double git. Triple git—git, git, git! Shaddup, Draco. Time to sleep."

"Mmm." Draco nodded thoughtfully. "Well, maybe not that bad, Her-mi-on-nee."

"Fit, though."

"Mmm-hmm," Draco's hum was very pleased. "Yeah, he is."

"Loves you," Hermione nodded. "Does."

Draco grinned madly.

"Oh, yes. M'lucky."

"Mmm. Me, too." Hermione agreed. "Lots and lots. Shaddup, 'kay?"

She was—he was—they were. She yawned, no longer able to stifle the languor that had been stealthily creeping upon her for the last few minutes. Really very. Very really. Lucky, that was.

"Nighty-night, Hermie," Draco petted her head at last. "Have a kip, eh? I tell Weasel where you are. He'll come retrieve you for the champagne breakfast toast, ducks. Sleep it off, alright? Back soon, I promise."

"Yesh. 'Nigh'"

Hermione snuggled into the lovely, lovely divan. A cashmere throw descended gently upon her, spelled there by Draco's murmur. She smiled.

"Oh, yesh…m'happy. _Am_."


	4. Act 1, Scene 1 'Harry's Office'

**Stage I: As You Like It**

**Act 1, Scene 1. Circa 2001-2002. The Ministry of Magic, Auror Headquarters, Harry Potter's office.  
**  
A slightly younger-looking Harry is seated dutifully at his huge glossy desk, fiddling with the piles of folders atop his blotter. He's frowning and he's pale, and seems a bit weary…as if his world is not quite the brilliant place he might've expected it to be, a few years prior, just post Battle of Hogwarts.

"Harry. Have you ever heard a Niffler laugh?" His guest, however, is chipper. Almost too much so.

"What—er, _what_?"

Luna Lovegood was ensconced upon one of the two chairs stationed opposite his piled-high desk, blinking inquisitively at him, quill at the ready. Wearing very little, really, and all of it quite form-fitting.

"Or those Triwizard dragons? Did they laugh at you, between the roaring? I always wondered about that bit. I'd think they'd think it was funny, being as they're so big and we're generally quite small…in comparison. "

"L-Luna?" Harry wasn't getting it; not at all. "Er? Ah…why are you here, Luna? Did I, um—did I miss something?"

"Harry. We have an interview? For _The Quibbler_ , remember?"

Harry looked 'round him, startled, and caught sight of the wall clock. The time he thought he had had available between one onerous task and the next had flown by far too quickly. His space was invaded by a wifty blonde with somewhat protruding eyeballs of blue. And Malfoy hair. And a notepad.

Clad in minimal clothing. Er, um.

He swallowed, dropping his own quill with a little annoying spatter. So much for reviewing the case files on the recently captured Dolohov. It would have to wait.

"Okay, hi, Luna. Um. Sure. Tea?"

"Alright, though I'm not thirsty." She twinkled at him. "You might be…though _I_ think it's the comfort aspect, with hot beverages. Tea, I mean, 'specially. It's always tea, isn't? You really don't like interviews, do you, Harry?"

"Ah…well. Now that you mention it…"

Harry smiled at her, a bit uncertainly. He didn't, as a rule, but this was Luna, and she was leagues better than anyone else who might grill him. The thought of Skeeter in his office made him wince automatically—but then Skeeter was banned from the Ministry, one of the few good things his fame and position had brought about, post-war.

"No, not really," he admitted, "but it's alright. I'm willing enough and I know your dad wanted it from me—to boost circulation, right? How's he doing, by the by, Luna?"

"Well, that and he's curious, Harry. I know I am."

"Super," Harry replied, his smile slipping. "Fantastic. Well, then, sure. Erm, fire away, Luna." He'd rather hoped the interest was beginning to die down, but Luna—for all her daft air—was a reliable barometer for certain things and one of those, oddly enough, was what was newsworthy. "Ask me whatever."

And Luna was Harry's friend. That he did know, though maybe not why exactly. No one knew why exactly, with Luna.

"So, the Niffler, Harry? Laughing?"

"Er…no." Harry struggled to remember her question, which was ridiculous, naturally. Why would anyone even care? "No, I haven't."

"What about Bugbears? Or Jarveys? Or hippogriffs? Do they laugh or do they giggle—or maybe snort? What d'you think, Harry?" She was seriously insistent, sitting forward. Enough so that her blouse—a baggy white affair, loosely gathered round the neck with a rainbow coloured riband—fell right off one shoulder.

A creamy sexy shoulder. Luna had grown up quite nicely. And out, too. Nice bosom. If Harry was interested, he'd have bedded her long since.

"Um, um, Luna, look—really, I'm not sure what—"

And Luna would've been quite agreeable. Luna, from what Harry understood, was quite adventurous—and not at all particular. She took all comers…if she liked them. Pansexual. No one knew, though, what precisely might trigger the liking, though, so quite a number of frustrated wizards and witches were to be found trailing forlornly—or hopefully—after Luna's microscopic skirts.

Harry thought that a hoot—that she was such a looker and that everybody gagged after her. The same damned people who'd played tricks on her, back at Hogwarts, too, often enough.

Most fitting, really. He smiled at Luna because of it, pleased. People deserved a little payback, sometimes.

"I mean, you've run into scads of magical creatures, Harry," Luna was saying, her fair head tilted to the one side. Blue eyes blinked at him. "There was the Basilisk and then Buckbeak. And all the Animagi, too. Did Professor Lupin howl when he wasn't in his werewolf form, a'tall? Did he sound like he might, maybe? I only really remember him from DADA, so I don't know. I always wondered, though."

"Look, Luna, I thought this was supposed to be about the war—you know, Voldemort, the Death Eaters…the Malfoys."

Luna stared at him for a moment and then fluttered her lashes, slowly.

"No, Harry. What _ever_ gave you that impression?"

Harry stared back, faintly confused.

"Er, Hermione?"

"Oh. No. No. Everyone knows about that bit, Harry—or they think they do, which is alright, I guess, as they won't likely listen to anything different."

"Erm—"

"No, I wanted to know about the creatures you've met, Harry. Or the Animagi, 'cause they count, too, really. Like your godfather—did he chase sticks when he was a dog? Did you ever have the urge to toss him a ball, maybe see what would happen?"

Harry gulped. He hated talking about Sirius; conversely, he also relished it. Leave it to Luna to ask him whether he'd ever wanted to play fetch with the man he'd once believed was a Grim, out to murder him!

"This isn't—quite—what I had in mind, Luna." Harry shook his head insistently. "Hermione _said_ —"

"Prolly Granger did," Luna nodded, tossing some hair about in a golden-white swirl. "But that's not anything new, Harry. The War, I mean. We were all there, the ones who matter, right? We know or we don't." She shrugged at him, clearly dismissing the war as newsworthy. "So, tell me, do you think Care of Magical Creatures gave you a leg up on speaking Parseltongue fluently? Did you need to practice it?"

"No—no, I didn't." Harry shrugged as well, after a long pause. What the hell, eh? This was _Luna_ , after all. "Okay, _no_. Creatures, then. Right. Um, what else did you need to know, Luna?"

"Remember that snake—the one Malfoy spelled? At your duel? Was he friendly? Not Malfoy; of course _he_ wasn't, not then, but the snake. You seemed on good terms with him. _Was_ it a him, for that matter? I know females have curves, where the eggs are laid from, but how would one go about addressing a snake properly if one doesn't know the sex? Do they mind that, Harry? That one doesn't know?"

"Er, no. Not in my opinion. And no, I never asked my godfather to play fetch, either. Although—"

"Yes, Harry?" Luna paused in jotting down her notes—which Harry promptly decided he didn't want to see, ever—and looked at him, face serene as ever.

"Although I might've thought about it, once or twice," Harry admitted. "And Remus didn't howl so much as sigh. He sighed a lot, as I remember. More than he should've."

"Oh. Perhaps because he couldn't, otherwise."

"Could be. I really don't know, Luna, sorry. Wish I did."

"It's alright." Luna made another note; Harry was of the opinion it likely had nothing to do with the interview. Possibly it was her shopping list or maybe a scrap of poetry—who ever knew, with her? "Harry, is there any creature you wish you'd had more time to spend with? Or a creature you want to meet?"

"Hum, lessee." Harry thought rather hard about this. He had to admit this was a relief, that Luna wasn't asking him _those_ kinds of questions. These were far better. "I think maybe…maybe the centaurs. I liked them. Not that they weren't a bit…frightening. I mean, they're very powerful and wise, and all that, but…they seemed very kind."

"Yes, I'd say so, too, Harry," Luna nodded. "But they're not really Creatures, exactly. They're beings—like Veela are, or vampires. Or werewolves. I was asking about the beasts more than the other."

"Oh, er…"

"Do you want to think about it? Because I can come back, Harry."

"Um…well," Harry shrugged. This was just a totally different line of enquiry than he'd been expecting; he had to admit he wasn't really prepared. But…come to think on it, it was sort of interesting, He had met a lot of strange creatures and not all of them had wanted to harm him. Though Nagini? Eugh! He didn't want Luna to ask him about that particular serpent—much nicer to think about the one he'd spoken to at the Muggle Zoo—the boa—or the whatever it was that git Malfoy had thrown at him in Third Year—no, Second. That had been Second.

His brain hurt, literally.

"If you don't mind it too much, yeah, Luna," he sighed, looking down at his gathered files. He was due at a meeting in the next half hour and he wasn't ready for that, either. "Sorry."

"No, it's alright. I told Granger you wouldn't be ready to talk about it yet, but she thought you might. Do you think maybe Malfoy will talk to me? He must've met a lot of creatures, growing up as he did. They travelled."

"Um…maybe? I only speak to him sometimes, Luna, so I don't really know. And really…not. I mean, it's been years now, since he went off to Romania. You'd have to ask him. Owl him, maybe."

"I think I will. He's returned, you know? He's nice to me, now. Very polite, always. On Diagon. And his mother is nice, though his father always seems to think I'm going to break things."

Harry sniffed. "You should, Luna. You should break things, if you're there—though I can't imagine why you'd ever go back there. Expensive things—treasures. He deserves it, that bastard."

"Oh...no, Harry." Luna shook her head and then popped her quill behind her ear, flipping her notebook closed. "Malfoy's been spending all that time mending. I don't think it would be a very kind way to repay him, do you?"

"Is he? Mending what, exactly, Luna?"

"His life, Harry. The Manor. His Mum and Dad."

Harry laughed, a sharp, short bitter bark. "Well, yeah, I suppose that's right. Needs to, doesn't he?"

Luna cocked her chin at him, her big blue eyes staring.

"Harry?" she said, in that voice that always warned Harry something utterly loopy was about to be said to him—to which he'd have no sane response, naturally.

"Harry, Weasley wants to talk to you. There's whatdoyoucallit—issues? And she and Granger and I have formulated a Plan. Since we have them…well, most of us. Longbottom, not so much."

"A Plan?" Harry couldn't help but capitalize the word, as Luna had. He blinked, grateful not to be hauled into addressing his 'issues'. They were many and he didn't want to think of them now, because then he'd abandon his paperwork and his scheduled appointment and run screaming. "What sort of Plan, Luna?" he prompted cautiously, much as one would poke something potentially lethal with a sharpened stick. "And which Weasley?"

"Oh, Harry, it's funny you should ask! That's exactly what Granger and Weasley want to tell you!"

Luna bubbled over with sudden loud laughter. She crossed her legs at the knee and fell into the state of it, happily collapsing, and Harry got a good eyeful of her knickers beneath the incredibly short hot pink miniskirt she wore. The knickers seemed to consist solely of one meagre inch of Lycra lace, stretched impossibly tight.

He shuddered, instinctively, sitting up straight as a poker and turning his eyes politely to the ceiling tiles, which were thankfully very bland after that visual shocker. Oh, Luna was a knockout, now she'd grown up, an absolute beauty in her own totally odd way, but she did utterly nothing for him—or his bits. No woman did. And this was alright, as it turned out. Pity was, well, very few wizards did much for Harry, either. And it wasn't as though Harry got out much.

"Er, Luna?" he attempted gingerly, as her gales of giggles at last died away. "What Plan are you referring to, exactly?"

"Theatricals, Harry," Luna sat forward, blithely discarding her barely used parchment and quill to the floor. She seemed all at once alight from within. "We're forming a Troupe, Harry, and we need you. You'll be a star of the stage, Harry, and it'll be grand! I can't wait!"

"Um…no." Harry knew trouble when he saw it. "No, thanks. Really. I can't. I've a job—I'm busy, Luna."

"Yes, you can, Harry," Luna blinked at him. "You aren't busy. Your job is silly—they won't allow you to Auror, Harry. And Granger's terribly busy and she's running the show, so you can, definitely, no question, because you have simply buckets of time. Just like Malfoy, really. It's all you have, now. You should use it."

"No, Luna, I can't," Harry replied, gently as he could in the circumstances. "Or maybe," he added, voice firming, "it's that I won't. I've no interest in performing in public—it's absolutely the last thing I'd ever choose, Luna, and Hermione should know—"

"Harry," Luna grinned sweetly at him, entirely unheeding. "We've already cast you. You can't let us down."

"…Ah."

The miniature hot pink pineapples in Luna's ears bobbled as she continued to blink at him. Harry would bet ten Galleons the little baubles glowed in the dark.

"Can you?"

Harry gulped.

"You," he croaked, "you said both Ginny _and_ Hermione are in on this, Luna?"

"Uh-huh," she nodded happily. "And me, of course."

"Er…how many others? Who else is involved?"

"Hmmm," she tilted her blonde head the other way, so that a long sweep of incredibly blond hair cascaded down the right side of her chest, trailing artistically into her forgotten teacup. "Lessee. Um. Longbottom and Blaise, the Thomases….um, let me think—oh! Lavender and Parvati. They handle the costuming. Um, Ronald Weasley, because he has to—Granger and Weasley both said. Er…Parkinson? She's the set dresser."

"Parkinson?" Harry gulped. "And by 'Blaise', d'you mean Zabini? That Blaise?" Harry had laid both hands flat on his desk; the stance provided some sense of balance in a world that was rapidly becoming Luna-fied.

"Oh, yes, Harry. Them. Er—him. Ummm…" she tapped her chin. "Millie! Millie Bulstrode. She's in charge of stunts and that sort of thing. Effects, special. And, er, she'll being doing up our playbills and posters. She's very graphically inclined, you know. Also, she sings. It's lovely."

"Ah—er, that's a lot of people, Luna," Harry replied slowly, digesting. He sat back in his well-cushioned seat, atop his Ministry-approved safety-swivelly chair, and glanced about his office: to the one side, filing drawers. To the other: more filing drawers, stacked. Behind him his framed Order of Merlin, First Class, and his Auror Certificate, signed by both Kingsley and Dawlish. Before him, two visitor's chairs and a small table between them, holding up a rather elaborate Ministry elf tea service. Everything in the room was of the finest quality, from the quills he used to the plush carpet on the polished wooden parquet flooring. His was a VIP's office, not the cubby the standard, common garden First Year Auror got handed.

"There's more," Luna murmured gently, staring at Harry's pencil cup as if it fascinated her. "Plenty more. More Weasleys—there are a great lot of them; I never realized, did you? And Hogwartsians. What a lovely word, Hogwartsians. Hmmm. Yes, but them as well. You won't be alone, Harry." She glanced about the office, lips pursed. "Not like _here_."

"An awful lot of people, really." Harry's face fell. It was rather clear he was being leaned upon. The way Luna leaned upon one, which is to say she more drifted by, off course, and knocked one off one's pins and in an entirely new direction. "I, ah. I'm alright, you know? Luna? I see loads of people; really don't require any more. 'Specially Malfoys."

"They're all friends, Harry," Luna replied, her eyes alighted on the Order of Merlin. " _We_ are. You want to be amongst friends, don't you?"

"Er," Harry hesitated, "…yes. Yes, I s'pose I do."

"Brilliant, Harry," Luna beamed at him. "I'm so very glad. Now we've that sorted—what about Jarveys? D'you think you'd like one for the office? As a companion animal? They make for lovely conversationalists, I hear. And they laugh."

Harry rolled his eyes at her, deliberately steering his mind away from the implications of what he might've just agreed to. The less he thought of that the better…and perhaps it would come to nothing, as so much else had.

"Luna, those beasts curse a blue streak! I can hardly have a pet Jarvey _here_. It'll insult someone—someone it shouldn't. They'll be furious—and I'll never make the field if I brass the upper echelon! Dawlish already doesn't like me much. Think of the consequences."

She blinked at him, slowly, and twirled a stray curl.

"But, Harry. Jarveys are amusing—they make you giggle." She leaned forward across his desk suddenly, confidentially. "You _and_ Malfoy, Harry. You need to chuckle—to chortle and giggle and guffaw. Daily."

"Look, Luna, this is really not the place for that—"

"Yes, Harry, it is," Luna replied sagely. "If there's any place in the world that needs it, it's this place. And you, as you're here, too. Malfoy made me laugh once, in his basement. Did you know? The wandmaker, too, just a little. Now, I realize he's not quite a Jarvey, but maybe Malfoy…maybe Malfoy…"

She tapped her chin contemplatively, her voice trailing off. Harry felt a distinct curl of dread in his gut, forming and expanding.

"Maybe Malfoy what, Luna?" he demanded, fretful. "What're you thinking _now_?"

Her smile was brilliant—and sly.

"Only that dragons laugh, too, Harry. Or they should—stands to reason. Someone should look into it, I think. Explore."

"Er…" Harry peered at his guest, puzzled. "Okay, and?"

But Luna was gathering up her things and rising, to teeter on four-inch heels. She looked down at him, her pale blue gaze hosting a distinctly Dumbedorian twinkle. And smiled—sweetly.

"Nothing, Harry. I'm off to explore some more…you think about the interview while I'm gone. And we'll see you, right? The Leaky on Friday this, half five, all the tables in the back. Can't miss us, really. Look for Malfoy, alright? Or a great many Weasleys, all at once. You'll find us, I'm sure."

"Luna! No, really, I don't think I can—"

"Bye, Harry,"

"Luna!"

"So glad you will, Harry…thanks. You're a true friend."

"Gah!"

When the door closed sharply behind her pert bottom, Harry had to struggle for a moment with his jaw, which refused to re-hinge properly.

"Well," he said to his empty office. "Well… _shit_!"


	5. Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 2 'Draco, Butter, and Tea'

**Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 2.** Circa 2001-2002. London, off Diagon Alley, a café. 'Draco, Butter & Tea'

* * *

Enter one Draco Malfoy, retired schoolboy menace. And one Luna Lovegood, who, in a very odd manner, is excruciatingly aptly named. Both are clad in the street fashions of Wizarding London, circa the very early years of the 21st century. Draco Malfoy, in classy tailored raw silk white button down, tight black five-button Levis, no socks and loafers, or Wizarding University Leisure Mode, Upper Class. He cuts a snappish figure and is remarkably handsome, albeit angular of feature. Hell, call it 'pointy'. He sports one pierced earlobe and a tiny emerald stud in it. His sleeves are rolled up over manly forearms, furred with very scant fair pelt, and a faded black inked tattoo peeks out, rippling as he nurses his teacup. Lovegood, on the other hand, is garbed in a variety of decadent cloth tatters with a variety of accessories and all of it skimpy and rather clingy withal. Corset bustiers and dangly earrings are heavily implied. Both have heads of exceedingly fair hair; they could be brother and sister from a distance.

Lovegood is remarkably well kitted out in the breast department; Draco is intriguingly lean and fit, and sports an arse to be mightily envied. Draco is gay; Lovegood's an unknown quantity.

They are young, they are beautiful and, of a certainty, they are not Muggles.

And place them in the biergarten of a certain Bohemian coffee shop on Comic Alley, just off Diagon, where Luna Lovegood, intrepid reporter for _The Quibbler_ and founding member of the brand-spanking-new theatre troupe The Unnamed Players, has at last run the dapper young Mr Malfoy to ground. Luna may've even been trying; in any case she has succeeded. Malfoy has a somewhat beleaguered air to him; Lovegood is bubbly, insistent and a good bit daft in her manner. They sit outside, enjoying the breezes and the strong sunshine. For once it is not raining. Everything is green and fresh, redolent of Spring. That may be the ambient Magic.

Luna is, in Draco Malfoy's learned opinion, always trying. Generally he endures her, with a faint smattering of actual liking. This is all Parkinson's fault and he blames her for it.

Nevertheless, it's a beautiful spring day in 2002 and Luna is up to all her old tricks, such as they are. Mr Malfoy is resisting like mad, naturally, but the outcome is sadly inevitable.

Like so:

"So, I really think you should, Draco," Luna announces to the world at large, apropos of nothing she'd been blabbering on about before. _Before_ had been all about Draco's travels to Romania and the dragons he'd worked with there; _before_ had also covered his present state of mildly entrepreneurial aimlessness. Draco was between jobs and 'resting', as they say in the parlance. His father had evinced his displeasure with that state, only just that very morning. As a consequence, Draco Malfoy was already a tad tense about the shoulder blades and neck region. He scowled.

"Think I should what, Lovegood?" Draco growled, fed up if not actually victualed. He couldn't simply vacate the table they shared and stroll away, as he so wished he could—that wasn't on—but he could emit off-putting vibes in the hope Lovegood would up and take herself away. Or he could attempt to do so, but his innately instilled good manners were preventing him from acting upon his bone-deep urge to mock, slash and flee post-haste. He fell back on snark, his old standby. "You're full of advice today; it's not like you. Been spending quality time with Parkinson again, have you?"

"Pansy is so pretty, isn't she? So pretty…"

Lovegood, having shared this, stared off into the far distance, apparently suddenly struck by the sheer force of cogent thought. Draco choked on his tea.

His old pal Pansy was not by any real definition of the word 'pretty' but…he supposed she was attractive, in a neo-strumpet, ex-Death Eater's wealthy daughter, Gothic Corpse Bride sort of way. Pansy favoured sporting leather and multiple piercings, black glossy nail lacquer and impossibly high heels with stabbing points. If the Devil wore Prada, Pansy wore Tripp and Toxico right along with her mother's pearls, combined with an intense air of antidisestablishmentarianist ic determination. Draco did have to admit the Look suited her.

Point was, unfortunately, that Pansy was not present to save him from Loony Luna. Draco was at her vacuous mercy.

"Yes, I do absolutely adore Pansy, Draco, and I'd love to show her, but that's not the point here." Lovegood, having paused for a sip and returned from whatever had claimed her attention, turned those pale blue searchlight eyeballs upon Draco again. "My personal fancies aside, Draco, the point is—"

"I can't believe you have one, actually," Draco muttered rudely, shuddering quietly at the thought of Pans and Loony in bed. That was a very disturbing mental image but also somehow exciting. His other hand strayed down his Levis to exert a bit of pressure on his todger, which had twitched. "Yes?" he added, loudly, shifting in his bent-iron patio chair uncomfortably. "Your point is?"

Luna beamed at him over her cuppa, waving a half-eaten mini-croissant. Flakes of buttery crust sifted down upon the tablecloth.

"We've this little group going on now, Draco, and we'd really like you to be a part of it."

"I don't want to," Draco shot back instantly, averse to any and all suggestions from Loony, merely on principle. "Really, Lovegood, I've no time."

"No, no!"

Lovegood shook her head slowly at him and waved her partially eaten pastry for additional emphasis, achieving a wide arc that threatened Draco's sharp nose. Draco flinched; Lovegood was not a pretty eater. He'd consumed meals with more aesthetically pleasing Horntails. Butter dripped, currents dribbled singly and stickily from the jam Luna had lathered her pastry with.

"Oh, no, no, no!" she replied brightly. "You have a great deal of time, Draco Malfoy. More time than you know what to do with, rather."

"Now, Lovegood," Draco began, reasonably.

"I have a solution," Luna insisted, peering at him sideways and squinty, her chin cocked. She grinned widely, revealing damp crumbs and yet more jam. "You should take it. More than that, you should gallop away with it, joyously. You should bask. _I_ am."

"Bask? Beg pardon?"

Draco firmly ignored any suggestion of him basking; Malfoys did not bask, precisely.

"Bask," Luna nodded. "More than that, Draco. Do it joyously."

"Hah! I do not have time to spare for such nonsense—there's where you're wrong, Lovegood!" Draco countered, mustering up all his inherited Malfoy backbone. "M'father is expecting me to ingratiate myself promptly into a paying position, you see, and I rather think that will eat up any time I might have left over, after sleeping and eating. All that bowing and scraping, you know—and the bootlicking. Let's not forget the bloody bootlicking," he added bitterly. "I haven't."

Malfoys were not in terribly high demand amongst the legion of more traditional wizarding companies. Draco knew this after a solid month of disappointing rounds of interviews. He was, though highly skilled and the possessor of many a fine NEWT, almost unemployable in his homeland. The thought of foreign climes—more salubrious—beckoned.

'Too much,' his personal representative had pronounced at the employment bureau. 'You'll have to fudge your CV, Mr Malfoy.'

"No…" he repeated himself, contemplatively, musing over his sure-to-be boring future, "I have yet to find myself a job, Lovegood. A real one. I don't have time to play with you. A job is my priority. Owl me later—perhaps in a decade. Perhaps in France. That should do it nicely."

Luna chuckled at him, fondly. She stuck the last of her croissant in her mouth and smiled widely at him through the crumbs.

"Mph'ar'u'ong," she burbled. "Nurff!"

"Excuse me, what?" Draco asked, politely. "You were saying?" He blinked at the masticated dough and dearly wished for Parkinson. Or possibly Goyle, who had rather better table manners than either of these silly girls.

"That's where you are in the wrong, Dra-co," Lovegood enunciated every syllable after swallowing. "The pos-i-tion I am su-ggest-ing is a pay-ing one, real-ly."

"Oh, cease with that annoying nonsense, Lovegood," Draco exclaimed. "I'm hardly a ninny! You can't pay me—you can't even afford to cough it up for this spread!" He gestured at the tiny table between them, packed with the remains of elevenses.

"Un-huh." Lovegood bobbed her chin at him amiably, slurping tea like a thirsty pony. "Right-oh, Draco. In any event, you'll take home Galleons aplenty to impress your Daddy, trust me. Just not at first."

"Not at first?" Draco was curious, despite himself. "Why not, Lovegood, if you don't mind my asking? What's the catch? What's the job, for that matter?"

"Because we need to put on a show first, silly," Luna laughed at him, reaching over to rub his Dark-Marked arm with smeared fingertips. She often did this for no good reason; Draco wasn't sure if there was a good reason now but Pansy wasn't present and she was his usual touchstone for literal Lovegood translation, as well as functioning as the social buffer between Draco and assorted riff-raff. Not that Lovegood was 'riff-raff', precisely. Straight-up unadulterated Lovegood was like a distinct shot of the espresso of unreality. Pure-blooded as they come and completely out to luncheon, and that likely due to the inbreeding that afflicted the upper reaches of the old wizarding families. "That's the way these things work, Draco," Luna nodded furiously. "No pain, no gain."

"Pardon? A show? What sort of show?" He gulped, fretting. This was ominous, Lovegood's enthusiasm. "And pain—what is this pain you mention?"

"To play. We need to play first. A play. But we have one all sorted out!" Luna crowed. She conducted the empty air before with both hands, stirring up the pollen from the flower bouquet set upon their table. Draco sneezed instantly. "You'll see! It'll be super, Draco! You'll love it!"

"S'cuse me," he murmured, dabbing at his afflicted nose. "What'll I love? I don't recall being willing to love anything, Lovegood. What the feck _are_ you babbling about? I don't have all day to hear you out, you know!"

"And you'll be perfect, Draco!" Loony babbled anyway. She always did; it gave Draco the migraine. "Of course—don't mention it. Bless you and all that, and erm, gesundheit. Anyway, I can see you in puffy pantaloons and a buckler, Draco—positively brilliant! And maybe all that in a violet shade, to highlight your brooding, Draco. With some lace at your throat. Dresden. You brood so attractively, Draco. We should use that, I think."

"I do?" Draco had lost the page; it was par for the course with Lovegood. He so needed Pansy here this morning, but he was sadly bereft. Pansy was in Paris, shopping. Or possibly Rio. Who knew? "Really? Ah, thanks, I think. Nice of you to say."

"Oh, you're very welcome, Draco. No problem!"

"Er, good, then." Draco sat back and sipped his tea calmly, playing for additional time to react to whatever odd proposition this was that involved him brooding, in purple, and people being in favour of it. Oh, right—he still needed to sort that. "Er. What exactly _is_ it you're suggesting here, Lovegood? Just tell me, in plain English, please. Um, now-ish. I'm running a bit behind this morning."

Lovegood practically climbed over the table between them, she leant so close to Draco and his tea cup.

"Acting, Draco. Hermione thought you'd be a natural at it. So here I am," Luna raised a blonde eyebrow conspiratorially and muttered out of the side of her mouth, for all the world like a telly 'tective. "The article was just a front, you know? I mean, really. Dragons are nice and all that but Snorkacks are so much more interesting to our readers. I had to plead with Daddy for a promise of the last page in Society. It was a real drag, Draco, but you are my friend. Of course I'd do anything for you."

"Was it now? Really?" Draco hadn't known his tale of dragon handling was just a run-of-the-mill back page story, but then didn't that simply figure? First positive attention he'd received since returning to the shores of his homeland and here Lovegood was telling him it was just a ruse and a time-waster. "And did you, really?" He blinked, calling upon the famed Malfoy savoir faire: when in doubt, smile and back away slowly. "Lovely, then, thanks for that. Ah. You know, Lovegood, I don't really think I'm interested in whatever it is you're proposing, sorry. I'm not actor material. I don't wish to be, either. And Muggle technology is arcane and confusing. I've enough on my plate at the moment-"

"Oh, but you are, Draco!" Luna flailed her arms at him, sloshing tea and gobs of jam, "you so are! You're perfect, Draco! I always thought so! Not a hair out of place, even when you threatened all those tiny little Hufflepuffs! Remember that, Draco? I was so impressed with you then and you'd had barely any training! Only what your father taught you-but really, I can't imagine a better villain, Draco. And I'd also imagine your Oberon would be famous. You really should. You're made for it. They'll adore you."

"My…my Oberon?"

"The king of Fairie, Draco," Lovegood nodded smugly, retreating just far enough away to snatch up yet another of the tiny pastries Draco had ordered along with his tea. She'd been helping herself to most of them; Draco had only managed to obtain one ruddy bran muffin out of the entire lot. A plain bran muffin. So exquisitely healthful it was abysmal. "Come now, you know that," Loony chided him familiarly. "You'd make a perfect Oberon. And likely too an amazing Mercutio. You're marvellous, really. Very adaptable. Bendy."

"Er, who, now?" Draco was confused. Of course he knew the King of Fairies, but Mercutio was someone new to his ken. "Who's that, Lovegood? This Mercutio fellow?"

"Oh, er, he's a Muggle, Draco."

"A Muggle? You think I'm like a Muggle?" Draco's instincts rose the fore in a clamour. He hissed, brows lowered in a dark scowl. "Don't even go there, Lovegood! M'father will have my bollocks if he even thinks I'm aping Muggles—I don't care what Granger's great bloody Reformation says, he's still a dyed-in-the-wool pure-blood! I'm toast if I actually go along with whatever it is you've got stuck in your barmy brain box, Lovegood. Give it up, do. Go bother someone else. Try Zabini on for size; he'll likely do it, the arse. He laps it up, that sort of thing. I don't."

Draco crossed his arms before his chest, huffing. Decidedly he was not seeking attention. Loony was correct; Father was all about attention, but Draco wasn't. He just wanted a quiet life—and a job that paid well. That's it. Nothing more, thanks ever so.

Now, to impress that upon Lovegood, which would be no easy task. Lovegood was Ravenclaw trained; they never, ever relinquished their more outlandish intellectually-based notions, even if the concepts they embraced were dead wrong and still in the water. Likely Lovegood had run some aptitude tests on him in secret, when he wasn't looking.

"Well," the Ravenclaw ninny tapped her chin with a pointy pink fingernail, one ragged from nibbling and with half the polish worn away. "What he doesn't know won't give him apoplexy, will it? Just don't tell him, Draco." She nodded happily, having solved that problem. "Not till later. But you shouldn't lie. That's not nice, either. But omission's alright, I should think. And your mum knows. Everything's groovy. Right? Oh—may I have that last one there? The cherry?"

"Don't tell him _what_ , Lovegood?" Draco insisted, waving impatiently at the cherry topped sweetmeat. "You haven't told _me_ , so how in Hades am I supposed to tell him anything? Try for clarity, will you? You're very confusing, you know, and I'm still a bit lagged from the Portkey, alright? Take pity—explain in words of few syllables for me."

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Draco," Lovegood hummed and smiled and petted him aimlessly on the arm, missing half the time and stroking Draco's half-consumed muffin instead, smearing butter all over his plate and the cloth. "Not being clear. 'Pologies. And thanks—this is very good. I do like cherry."

"Lovely," Draco bit out. "I'm glad. Tell him what, Loony? Tell me what, for that matter?"

"I meant to say, don't tell him you're working for us. With us—together. What he doesn't know won't hurt his sensibilities, will it?"

"Wait just a bleeding second here, Lovegood," Draco gritted through impressively clenched teeth. "Who exactly ever said they'd work for you, anyway? Because I distinctly recall not agreeing to anything of the sort! And who is this Muggle you're comparing me to? You've not said much of anything, Loony, at least not to the point. Try again."

"You, Draco," Lovegood sat forward again, entirely too close, and jabbed Draco's chest twice, in rapid succession. Her fingernails, though unkempt, were quite sharp. "Are a natural born actor. We need you. We might even pay you, eventually. So yes, that's that. It's decided."

"It is not decided!" Draco huffed. "Nothing is decided, you barmy bint! I never said yes to any of this nonsense. Have you forgotten? I still need to procure a paying position! That's my imperative, Loony. Get that through your blonde head, will you?"

"But you'll have one, Draco," Luna was absolutely beatific. Draco gawped at her bland air of absolute certainty. "No need to be rude about it. Just as soon as we've had our first production. It'll be a wild success. Ginny Weasley's already making up posters and even Harry's signed on with us. We can't miss! It's a sure thing!"

That set Draco back on his heels. Potter?

"Er, Potter? Potter has? What's this you're going on about now, Lovegood? This is first time you've mentioned Potter. I thought—"

"He's not with the Aurors any longer, Draco—he's with us. And the two of you together in the footlights will be grand! I can hardly wait to see it! Waiter!"

"The two of us…together…?" Draco murmured. His head spun. Why, he and Potter had had no contact since just after the huge sorting out that had happened after the final battle. Draco had hared off to Romania to take a job with Charlie Weasley—after much internal anguish-and Potter had entered the Auror corps, or so he'd deduced from gossip and the papers. He'd not seen Potter in a dog's age. "Hang on, Lovegood," he gasped. "Why would Potter ever give up Aurors to prance about a two-bit stage out in the benighted countryside? He's no actor!"

Luna's grin was absolutely blinding in its brilliance. The waiter, newly arrived, literally reeled in his tracks.

"Ma'am?" he breathed, gazing at Lovegood with a stricken look about him. "May I be of service? _Please_?"

Luna glanced up at him, all fluttering lashes and crumb-plastered smiles, and the poor clod flushed a brick red, his moderately handsome face mottling.

"Ooooh!" he moaned, features slackening as the full force of Luna-on-sugar walloped him. Draco growled, on principle. This was disgusting! He was trapped in a bad het sex scene and couldn't for the life of him escape politely!

"Oh! You're Rolf, aren't you? I've heard about you!" Luna's face was alight with sudden comprehension. "You're bloody fit, Rolfie."

"Have-have you?" the waiter whispered, gulping. "Oh! Oh, erm—tha-that's good, isn't it? I am, actually, very much so. Er, Rolf. That's my name, yes. Do you—so, ah, you like it? M-Me?"

"Ack!" Draco choked. "Stop that, you two! Decorum!" This was horrid; how could she, with him sitting right here?

"Oh, absolutely," Luna gushed on, oblivious. "It's so—so manly, Rolf. Very suitable." Luna gave the waiter a very visible once-over, from boot tip to wild cowlicks and Draco sneered; he'd never been privy to a Lovegood on the pull before and this was certainly highly distasteful. He objected strongly, as anyone in their right mind should.

"Oh, please, Lovegood," he grumbled, "enough already! Order whatever and let this chap be about his business, please. I'm running out of time, here. And I'm still clueless as to what you want of me."

"Hush, Draco, this is Rolf What'sit. He's an aspiring actor, just as you are." Lovegood sent him a quick and fleeting frown. She turned back to the blushing young man in the stained white apron. "Rolfie, meet Draco. Draco, this is Rolfie. You'll be working together shortly. Rolfie, we can count on you? For the show?"

Rolfie—poor, unfortunate bleeder, Draco thought, to be landed with that lousy nickname and so quickly!—swallowed hard and practically genuflected at Lovegood's wriggling bare toes. They peeped through her lace-up Grecian sandals. Which were tied off at the knee. A good twelve inches was bared to the world above that before there was any actual skirt to mask Lovegood's privates. Draco kept his eyes averted; Rolfie did just the opposite, ears steaming, eyes bulging. Flies bulging, too. It was clear he was smitten.

No accounting for taste, Draco concluded, his eyes tactfully focused on nothing in particular. If Rolfie wanted to make a fool of himself over Loony, it was his funeral—provided he didn't actually fall upon her like the ravening dog he was beginning to resemble. Poor chap was panting, literally! Blech!

"Oh! Oh, yes, Miss! Anything you want, alright? _Anything_!"

"Brilliant." Lovegood was terribly happy over something; almost triumphant, Draco thought. "I think I could love you, Rolf. We'll see, though. Then, erm…more tea and may I have your Floo address, please, Rolfie? I'll drop by later, at your flat. You have a flat, don't you? When's your shift finished? Do you have a roomie? Because you should probably send him or her away, if I am. We'll be wanting some privacy."

"Urgh," Rolfie groaned, sagging. He dropped his serving tray with a hideous clatter, which fully revealed the tremendous swell in his shop apron, jutting. Draco attempted to appear as if he knew no one and was present at the table entirely by accident.

"Tacky," he muttered darkly. "Lovegood, I am still here, remember? But I won't be for much longer, so you need to drag your eyeballs off this unfortunate bloke and he needs to remove his tongue from the table and I wish to Merlin you would finally make clear what it is you want from me. I have a pressing appointment, one sharpish. I can't be late."

"Oh!" Luna dimpled at him. "Sorry, Draco. I was distracted, wasn't I?"

"Aren't you always?"

Rolfie sagged miserably, having lost her attention.

"No, you don't, Draco," Lovegood bustled on, ignoring Draco's snippishness. "I've cancelled that for you—you'll be with me, instead. We're meeting up with everyone to discuss this. That's alright, isn't it? Your mum said it was fine with her when I owled earlier. She thinks it's lovely, you having more friends. Very matey."

"What _what_? What the hell _are_ you talking about, Lovegood—cancelling my appointments without my leave?" Draco was incensed. "How dare you—"

Loony petted Draco's muffin again, her long blond hair trailing into the sugar bowl. Poor Rolfie still stood motionless by their table, his jaw dropped and practically swinging in the spring zephyrs, eyes glued to Lovegood's every incomprehensible motion. He seemed particularly entranced with her toes.

"Go away, Rolfie," Draco hissed, feeling bilious. "Get Lovegood her tea, will you?"

Lovegood paid no heed to Rolfie or the professed need for more tea. She stuck her fingers in her empty cup and twiddled with the dregs, though.

"Oh-ho!" she trilled. "There's a Grim! I must remember to tell Daddy that. Remind me, won't you, Draco?"

Draco shuddered. "No," he replied flatly. "Come on, Lovegood. Spit it out, please. Before I froth, preferably."

"Mmm, ew. Please don't."

"Lovegood!"

"Right, right. Well, your mum loves the whole idea, Draco, so that's alright then. No problem with lunch plans—we'll have sugar and fats. Fried ones. I'm ordering doughnuts. They're brain food. And we'll just talk your father into it later, okie-dokie? But I'm sure he'll be copacetic. It's attention, after all, and that's what he's all about, isn't it? He'll like it, trust me. He'll be so very proud of you, Draco, once he sees you. And quite naturally, as you'll be earning it, all of it—oh, and Rolfie?! You're still here?"

"Yes, he's still here, Loony," Draco snarled, "More's the pity!"

"Uh…huh?" Rolfie, poor chap, waggled his stubbly chin like a bloody bobble-doll. "Yeah…is that alright? I'm just looking at you, Miss. May I? Look at you? You're…so...so…very-"

"Oh my gods! Ridiculous!" Draco, overcome, nearly sicked up. "For Merlin's sake, go away, man! I can't stand the sight of you! Get the bloody tea!"

"How sweet of you," Luna giggled at Rolfie. Neither of them paid the slightest attention to Draco. "Of course you may. I like being looked at, Rolfie. And I like looking, too."

"Gah…." Rolfie gurgled, purring.

"Of all the! Rolf, old chap!"

Draco waved a hasty arm in front of the moonstruck waiter's daft face. He was of the opinion Rolfie might drool momentarily—or rip off his server's apron and go Wildman on idiot Lovegood, right under Draco's disgusted nose. Not that Lovegood wasn't attractive—she was, in a rather wifty, daft-as-houses way—but he certainly wasn't used to enduring this sort of raw lust emanating off a chap over his elevenses. It was rather sick-making, especially as he hadn't pulled in ages, being stuck in bloody backwater Romania.

" _ROLF_!"

"Ngh?"

"Look, er, Rolf," Draco went on hastily, once Rolfie spared him at least a cursory glance.

Enough, as they said, was rather more than enough. He was rather stuck with Lovegood till he sorted out what promise she was under the assumption he'd so blithely given. Because he'd not, at all, and that had to be made clear before he was further embroiled. Had to extricate himself from that, right smart. Especially as his Mum had been made aware of whatever scheme Lovegood was cooking up in that empty head of hers and apparently approved it—and that was never a good thing.

"The tea the lady requested? Would you mind bringing it? And another plate of those little pastries—apparently the lady has an appetite this morning. Would you go do that thing I ask of you right now, please? The lady and I are in the midst of a discussion."

"Gerf."

Luna gabbled something in the affirmative through the remains of the last Danish. Draco snatched up his half-muffin defensively. Lovegood was eying it predatorily even as she chewed.

"Must I?" Rolfie pleaded, turning huge puppydog eyes to Luna in an appeal. He was so obviously smitten, Draco felt bilious. "Must I really go now? I don't want to leave you, Miss."

"Mnph-hurr!" she gargled. "Orrf, f'nk'ssss! 'Ater!"

"Quite so," Draco nodded. "Don't mention it, Lovegood." He looked to the gobstruck Rolfie. "Well? Be off, then," he ordered sharply. "There's a good fellow. Tea—pastries. Got it?"

"Oh—ah!" Rolfie smiled dreamily at them both, finally edging off in the direction of the kitchens. "Um…promise me you won't go while I'm gone, Miss? Please? I still have need of your Floo address, okay? And you mine…and…and we should, maybe, you know-"

" ** _Now_** , Rolfie!" Draco ordered, his small store of patience exhausted.

"Mmmm!" Lovegood, that bloody mankiller, grinned stickily through her tea. "A'righ! 'Ov'oo!"

She petted his towel-draped arm and Rolfie practically swooned across Draco's lap, the dirty little randy bastard.

" **Tea**!" Draco snapped, in best Malfoy authoritarian timbre. With due force. " _Now_ , Rolfie! More tea! Spit-spot. Bustle about, man! No drooling!"

"Erm! Al-alright! Go-going!"

Rolfie meeped and fled, finally. Draco snorted after his retreating figure, deeply thankful.

"Good riddance. Now, Lovegood," he claimed her wandering attention firmly, as soon as poor Rolfie had tacked off to the fastnesses of the café, stumbling his way there backwards and never taking his eyes off Draco's companion, "what _is_ all this about Potter? What's he got to do with it?"

Luna fondled her cup.

"Um, he's one of us, Draco—just as you are. The few, the proud, the Unnamed Players." Luna giggled, madly, as was her wont. "We're a band, don't you know? It's all Ginny Weasley's idea. Or maybe not, I forget, rather, but it doesn't matter. It's all good, anyway. And you'll be one of our stars, Draco. I can hardly wait to write your feature for _The Quibbler_!"

"My what?" Draco was astounded. "My feature? What're you talking about, Loony? What feature?"

"The one you'll have after opening night, Draco. In _The Quibbler_. Don't be silly. I can't very well write up a feature till after you've done your bit, can I?"

"Um, no…" Draco allowed that made sense, of sorts. "What, then, is my bit, as you so vaguely term it? Explain."

"I'm thinking you'll be the best ever Oliver, Draco…or perhaps Touchstone. You could play Touchstone. Or Rosalind, in drag, but I really think we shouldn't push the parameters till we've gathered a stable following, don't you? Even if Shakespeare's players were all male, we don't have to be, although there's Polyjuice, which is an excellent solution—"

"Wait!" Draco stopped her with a hand thrown up. "I don't follow, Lovegood. Go slowly, will you? Who are these people you mention? Muggles? Muggle actors, like on the telly?"

"Characters, Draco. You'll play one of them. Hermione will sort it all out—she does our casting. And I think Harry might be Orlando. He's a rather natural Orlando, though I do like him for the role of Jacques, as he can brood with the best of them, but you can as well, so it's a rather a toss up, and now there's Rolfie, so we'll have a real expert on board, to show us the ropes—"

"Ropes? On board? Is this some sort of ship, Lovegood?"

"Oh, Draco, what an apt simile!" Lovegood beamed at him. "I knew you were quick on the uptake! And yes, it is, rather, and now you're part of the crew and we'll all be merry as gigs—or are they grogs? Who knows, right? But to business, now; mustn't be distracted. We'll meet up with Harry and the rest over at the Leaky in a half-hour, so save room for some luncheon, alright? Tom's idea of a ploughman's is very heavy on the intestines I always thought, and I've not been able to talk him into offering a veggie entrée yet. Have you?"

"Er, no…which isn't to say I've thought of asking him, either, Lovegood. We're, uh, meeting up with Potter, then?"

"Mmm-hmmm. I'm so excited. You two will be reunited after ages, Draco. It's really very Jacobean, don't you think? Almost Sheridan, really. Long-lost heroes, meeting again, falling into one another's arms and embracing in manly fashion. The audience will eat it up, I'm sure. Don't forget to let him know you've missed him, Draco. I rather think he'll be needing the reassurance. He's nervous; I don't know why. Plus, you'll be working together, you and he, so you should try to rub along—"

Draco, drowned in a sea of mad tangents, flopped his chin into one supporting palm and fervently wished for Tom's Firewhisky. Tea wasn't the answer—not for anything involving Lovegood, at least. He only hoped he'd come out of this with his dignity intact…although nothing was certain. Potter was involved.

_Nothing_.


	6. Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 3. 'Harry, At the Leaky'

**Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 3.** At the Leaky.

Harry was still a bit shaky about all this. He tried to hide his unease by making conversation, which rather made it worse, not better. He'd come late in any event, rather hoping to skive altogether, but Gin had snagged him right outside the Ministry's box and forcibly Side-Alonged him to the Leaky, so there was no politic way clear. Not without offending her and she was a bit Hex-happy, in the wake of the war. Merlin, likely she'd always been that way—she had all those older brothers.

He shrugged, resolute. He was here and he might as well attempt a good time. Right?

"So, mate," he said to Neville, who was up from Hogwarts for the weekend, "will you be acting, too?"

"Oh, no, no, no," Neville chuckled, waving his pint genially. He beamed at Harry, his now mostly good-looking face reflecting a high degree of equally good humour. "Not me. I'm backstage, if anything. Luna says my presence overwhelms the scenery or some such nonsense; won't let me anywhere near the footlights."

He didn't, however, seem unduly put out by that. At all. Harry frowned. He was to be firmly on stage. Hermione, Ginny and Luna had been quite insistent about that. He blinked; he could use some back-up.

"Pity," he remarked. "Could use you, I think." He glanced about him, taking in two tables comprised of mainly witches. "Looks like we're woefully short of men."

"Well," Nev temporized. "Luna's been telling me—"

"Oh, Harry!" Hermione leant across the little gap between tables. Lavender sat opposite her and Ron had been just a moment ago, but he was up the bar now, ordering another round of chips from Hannah Abbott. "Funny you should mention that."

Hermione grinned at him, with her 'I know a secret you don't know!' face on. Harry played along; Hermione did so love that feeling and he was happy enough to keep her happy.

"Really?" He quirked his eyebrows quizzically, feigning utter ignorance. He knew a few secrets, too, but likely they weren't the same ones. "Why?" He waved a hand at all the familiar—Ginny, Parvati, Lavender, Pansy—but definitely female faces and shrugged a shoulder. Males attached to the gaggly group of Unnamed Players were minimal, as in there were very few of them. No wonder the girls had cajoled him into participating—they needed actors something fierce.

"There's only me, Zabini and Goyle here, Hermione. Hate to say it but I don't think that'll fly. Need actors too, you know. Need more guys."

"And one more," Hermione giggled. "We've got one more already, Harry," she nodded sloppily, on her way to slightly toasted. "A ringer. You'll be…you'll be surprised, Harry," she added, choking happily on her gin fizz. "Absolutely."

Harry cocked his head at her.

"Yeah?"

"Oh, yes," Hermione grinned wickedly, eyes sparkling. "He's Luna's special catch-oh, along with you, of course. We've been keeping him a secret, actually." She leaned a bit closer, revealing a rather nice chest and mumbling in what she likely thought was sotto voce, being on her second fizz of the hour, but really wasn't. They could've head her loud whisper in the private rooms Tom kept upstairs. "Didn't think he'd bite, really. Surprised he did."

"Why? Who is it, Hermione? Someone special? Someone who can boast maybe even a little bit of actual experience?" Harry glanced about him, at the assembled—and not very promising—group of Nameless Players. "'Cause I'm no actor and from the looks of it, we could use a real actor right about now. None of this group's ever done diddly on stage that I know of."

"But we all have, in a manner of speaking." Hermione giggled again, wetting her lips and jiggling her Friday evening cleavage, looking very mysteriously pleased with herself. "Metaphorically. And no, he's nothing like that, Harry, but. Buuut…"

"Yes, but?" Harry grinned at her. "Not good with suspense tactics, Hermione—you know that. Tell me who it is, then."

"He is, well…He's got…well, let's just say he's got a lot of charisma, Harry." Hermione looked terribly pleased with herself. "A. Lot. Of. Charisma. Buckets of it-bushels." She tossed her head for emphasis. "He's fit, too. And filthy rich. In fact, we'll be meeting at his place after this—tonnes of room there. And redecorated."

"Hmmm," Harry pondered.

Who was this mysterious man Hermione referred to? The troupe was supposed to be amateur, mostly. Or so he'd understood from Gin, when she'd twisted his arm, claiming they desperately needed him. 'Fit' men with charisma and buckets of Galleons were in obvious short supply tonight, unless one counted Zabini. It was true enough that bastard was fit—the blackguard radiated sex appeal like a bloody Chanel advertisement—but that was only one wizard amongst a veritable herd of bloody girls. No…it likely wasn't Zabini.

He shrugged again. "Whoever he is, he'd better be good at it, Hermione," he sneered mildly, not at all sanguine about the success of this mad idea of his three favourite women. "Or your Nameless Troupe is bloody sunk."

"Why, indeed, Potter," a silky voice murmured behind him, just off Harry's half-lifted shrug of disbelief. "I don't think that'll be a problem. Not now that _I'm_ here."

"Oh, no, Hermione." Harry's eyes instantly went to his mate's merry expression in horror. "Not Malfoy?"

"The very same, Potter. So nice to see you again. A…pleasure."

"You must be joking me?"

Hermione waved him off saucily. "Of course not, Harry. Draco is perfect."

Harry wheeled his arse about on the bench, staring up over his pint with wild eyes behind his specs. The pint slopped and he sent a quick automatic spell to prevent the trickles of Butterbeer from trickling down his sleeve.

"Malfoy?!" he roared. " _Perfect_ Malfoy?" He half-rose from his seat, in a response caught somewhere in the unknown territory between fight and flight. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

Malfoy—that unctuous prick—sent him a sly smile, one that revealed even white teeth and narrow pink lips, stretched thin.

"To save the day, Potter," he shot back, winking. His elegant robes revealed a very fit figure indeed, encased in raw silk and black denim. "Of course. Why else?"

"Ruin it, more like," Harry snarled. "Don't tell me you're Luna's 'secret weapon', Malfoy! I'll never believe it!" he stormed, slamming his pint down upon the table's smeared wooden surface. "That's ridiculous!" He turned accusing eyes to his best mate, who was goggling up at the two of them, and smiling like a silly bint, sod her. "Hermione!" Harry cried out. "What the fuck is up with this?"

"Oh, really, Potter," Malfoy shrugged and slid onto the unoccupied bench across from Harry, Neville having sidled away at some point. "You make too much of it, git. Lovegood requested. I, being a polite chap, unlike others of my acquaintance," and here he shot a sizzling, reapproving glare Harry's way, "agreed to aid a maiden in distress. Well, make that maidens, as there's dear Granger here and your Ginevra. That's all there is to it."

"Hah!" Harry snorted. "There must be a catch somewhere, Malfoy!" he accused. "You never do anything unless there's something in it for you—I can attest to that!"

He glared at Malfoy, who had the gall to smile sweetly at him and lift his goblet of Firewhisky in a silent toast.

"No catch," Malfoy replied mildly. Followed that with a wicked white grin, the sort that melted barmaids at twenty paces. "Just lending a helping hand, Harry. Out of the goodness of my heart, truly."

"Ha-Harry?!" Harry flushed fire-engine red in consternation. "How dare you address me as 'Harry', Malfoy? Besides, you're up to something, aren't' you?" He frowned suspiciously.

"Of course I am, Harry—acting, git." Malfoy raised a pale eyebrow at him, much in the manner of a matador. "But we're to work together, mate. Surely we can get over the past and be friends, now?"

"No!"

"Harry!" Hermione scolded. "Be nice."

"Yes, be nice, Harry," the git had the gall to repeat. He smirked. "I won't hurt you, I promise."

"Erk?" Harry was flabbergasted. Zabini he could barely wrap his head around yet, but Malfoy was a whole new kettle. He and Malfoy had never gotten along, really. Even after the war, there'd been a lingering sense of unfinished business between them, the few times they'd stumbled across one another at Diagon or at the Ministry. He'd never been so glad in his life to hear that Malfoy—oddly—had taken himself off to Romania to work with Charlie—of all people—at the dragon preserve.

"I don't twig," Harry announced flatly. "This makes no sense at all, in any universe."

"Oh, really? I don't see why not, Harry."

The git had the bollocks to sprawl back in his seat and unbutton his collar, whist Harry gulped air furiously, speechless, so appalled the aforementioned air whistled through his nostrils.

"Eh-er, what?" he demanded, nearly speechless. He sagged abruptly back onto the bench, feeling wobbly. "You're—you're really one of us now, Malfoy? Has Loony run mad?"

"Possibly," Malfoy allowed, his smirk segueing into a real smile. Harry's jaw dropped: git almost looked pleasant. And he was fit, yes, absolutely, but he was still a very—very—suspicious person. It would behoove Harry to remain wary.

"Hardly," Malfoy continued mildly. "She'd a need and I filled it, that's all. It suits, I think." He regarded his buffed nails with a certain air of satisfaction. Harry gamely swallowed back bile.

"Well, that's it in a nutshell, Harry," Hermione poked her pert nose in, grinning and flapping a hand happily. "Malfoy here's an accomplished singer, don't you know, and too, it's a wizarding family tradition, people putting on little plays to amuse their relatives."

"What-what?" Harry was gobsmacked again. "That—that's so archaic, Hermione! Bloody Middle Ages! You can't be serious?"

"Oh, very, Harry," Malfoy purred, his long fingers twiddling his collar buttons in a sly, 'come hither' manner. "Pure-bloods have many a fine and ancient tradition, Harry. Acting out little scenes to amuse each other in our drawing room is only one of them. Had to do something all those long winter nights, right? And dear Loony's only taking advantage to amuse the plebes in this time of cultural rebirth and rejuvenation—a fine and noble calling."

"You git! 'Fine and noble' my arse! Like you care about Muggles, Malfoy!"

"And of course I can act—practically cut my teeth on that bloody wizard Shakespeare, back in the day. Can sing a few bars, too," the git added smugly. "Likely more than you can, Harry."

"Gah!" Harry flapped his open-jawed mouth uselessly. "Grrr!"

Neville, who'd drifted back again and was standing, observing quietly, gave him a quick comforting whack across the shoulders.

"Buck up, mate," he advised serenely. "I think Malfoy here will be fine, don't you? Look how he managed to stave off old Voldie's Legilimency all those years, yeah?" he said. "Good Occlumens makes an excellent actor, yeah? Stands to reason. He'll likely make a fine addition to the Troupe, really. Natural actor and all that. Just what's needed."

"Nrgh!" Harry shook his head from side to side, wordlessly. Apparently this was a given; Harry would be forced to deal with the obnoxiously fit—and charismatic!—prick across from him, whether he willed it or not. "No!" he whimpered. "Say it ain't so!"

"It's so, Harry," Hermione nodded. "Already settled, right and tight, so, er—give up your posturing, alright? War's over with. That's the whole point here."

"She's right, mate," Nev nodded. "T'is a new era, thanks to you."

"Argh!" Harry moaned, flapping his hands about. "This can't be happening to me!"

He dropped his wrinkled forehead into one hot palm, rubbing it frantically to ease the migraine that approached like a runaway lorry.

"So dramatic," Malfoy smirked. "You're a natural already, aren't you? Won't have much to teach you then, will I?"

"Teach- _teach_ me?" Harry whipped his head straight back up on his neck, staring aghast at his nemesis. "What d'you mean, Malfoy—'teach _me_ '?" he demanded, flapping his hands so much so he nearly sent his pint flying off the table. "I'm not having you for a tutor! I don't even have revision!"

"But you do, Harry. You do."

Malfoy grinned. He'd three buttons undone, revealing the beginnings of a very nice chest, and his robes had been shrugged off altogether. He was the very picture of a leading man, Malfoy.

"I'm your drama coach, Harry—didn't you know?"

Hermione giggled again, nodding; Harry resisted the strong urge to smack her.

"Er, _what_?"

Malfoy sent him another of those reproving frowns of his, the superior sort.

"But, now that I've seen you again, Harry, I do rather think we'll need to work on your vocabulary first," he smarmed. "It's abysmal. You seem to be stuck solidly on words of one syllable when you emote naturally. That'll never do when you're called upon to soliloquize. It must come from the heart and it must be sincere."

Harry only stared at him, whilst Hermione continued her bout of half-stifled giggles.

This was awful, what had been done to him by the three women he considered his closest female mates. Pairing him up with Malfoy? It was Potions class all over again, by Godric! They'd do nothing but snipe at one another, he and Malfoy—Harry was certain of it.

"I think we'll have to begin sooner rather than later, Harry," Malfoy cocked his pale head, clearly mulling. "You'll stop by at mine after this and we'll get started, alright? Brilliant," he added when Harry only stared, mouth open. "I'll open the Floo for you. We can go together."

"Nrhgh."

Well, Harry did moan a bit, yes, but that was likely only in automatic response to Malfoy's undeniable charisma—which the git was revealing, one tiny pearlized button at a time.


	7. Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 4. 'Malfoy Manor, South Ballroom; Erised-the-Ex'

**Stage 1, Act 1, Scene 4.** Malfoy Manor, South Ballroom, some weeks after the Scene at the Leaky. Rear-stage right side is a two-riser broad dais once used for a Wizarding orchestra. All the various and assorted Troupe Members are on this makeshift stage, in loose groups, gossiping and tending to theatrical tasks, excepting three. There is bustle, of a quiet sort, amongst the Company. Centre-stage is a huge and very familiar hunk of Old Magic, positioned between two marbled supported pillars, and it reflects, hazily, the three persons gathered before it—Malfoy Junior, Lovegood and Longbottom—as two of the three converse intensely in hushed tones. It reflects the figure of Harry Potter, entering front stage-right and in a flurry of scarlet robing and stompy boot heels, too.

* * *

"Where in bloody hell did you come across _this_ , Luna?" Harry pointed and gasped. He'd only just tumbled through the Floo and into Malfoy's ballroom and this—this horrible sight was the first thing that greeted him.

It was the Mirror of Erised, propped up between two ornately carved columns, and it shouldn't be plopped down here, in this place of once-hated memory. The two together—Manor and Mirror—were simply too, too much!

"What the fuck?" he wanted to know, shuddering with a sudden whipped-up fury and the lashings of remembered pain.

"What. The. **Fuck**?"

He fell back a pace, pointing accusingly at the Magical Miscreant. He'd been so lonely, then—so dreadfully lonely, and it was clearly to be seen in his twisted expression. "Send it back! Get it out of here, Luna!"

One of the small group of three turned her blonde head to glance at him briefly; the Wizards fell silent and raised curious eyebrows at Harry, fair and dark both.

"Oh, no, Harry." Luna cocked her chin at the Mirror, regarding it, ethereally vapid and sharp-set of eye all at once, as only she could manage. "I think it's rather alright now, Erised. I tested it, you see, when Neville found it. He tested it, too. It's fine. Oh, and Nev, my sweet Nev, pumpkin, we need to—"

Harry growled his frustration in Lovegood's general direction. For the short time he'd gained it, he'd already lost her flitting attention; she was knee-deep in rapt conversation with Neville again.

"It. Is. **NOT**. Fine!" he shrieked through his nose. His teeth clenched. He quite thought they'd crack, too. "It is an abomination, Luna! Vanish it, right now!"

"Hey, but...what's your problem, Hero Harry?"

Draco Malfoy, the quiet 'third man', came sauntering a step nearer Harry, hushed as the proverbial mouse in the pantry despite all his Purebred glamour. He quirked a quick wry lip at his latest arrival, but not maliciously. All about the lounging, at-ease in his demesnes, was Malfoy the Junior...and he was clad jauntily in a pair of fanciful house-slippers, something his angry guest noticed only peripherally, but noted all the same. Same as he noticed Malfoy was smiling at him as if glad to see him here, and in a great good humour, neither of which being a state of being which Harry was interested participating.

He snorted, his ire and agony building.

" _Problem_ , you say!?"

"Something not right about this mirror?"

Harry, incensed and denied Lovegood, let loose on the closest available target.

"I'll say!" he barked stormily, giving up on Luna as a bad show and glaring daggers at his genial host. "This! This thing! It has to go, Malfoy!"

He pointed at it accusingly, hand shaking and wand with it, 'defense' in every line of posture.

"Yes?'

"Erised! Dumbledore stored it away, ages ago and for good reason!" Harry growled, aghast that his sole attentive audience of one only looked upon him with a mild sort of curiousity, making no move to rectify the situation at hand. "I'm serious, here! It's bloody dangerous; sucks you right in! It needs to be cast out, right this instant! You don't want it in your damned Mansion, Malfoy. Trust me on that!"

"Why, Potter?" Draco widened those speaking grey eyes of his in a show of honestly innocent surprise. 'I have no clue' was what he projected, and an upturned palm only emphasized that emoting. "It just arrived this morning and Loony really wants it here; was insistent. For Lavender's use, I think. Costuming, you know." He shrugged. "And maybe for rehearsals, for the actors to see how they look. And the wards let it through without contest. It's not pinging them. I don't see the problem, sorry."

"It's a Magical Item, Malfoy!"

Harry was well nigh spitting, he was so upset. Why would no one listen? Not even Malfoy, who should be able to recognize an Evil Magical Item every time? For fuck's sake!

"Yes? Okay? Plenty of those, here." Draco gestured about him. There were indeed, and that wasn't even counting the props assembled.

"A very highly dangerous Magical Item!" Harry scowled. "You know all about that sort, right? Don't you?"

"And?" Malfoy looked blank. "I'm not sure I follow?"

"Oh! Forget it! Luna! Luna, _listen to me_!"

Harry, mad of eye, spun 'round to confront both his daft female friend and the quietly looming bulk of good old steady-as-a-rock Longbottom, waving his arms at them even though they stubbornly didn't so much as spare a glance his way, so intent were they upon each other.

"Listen to me! Luna, what were you and Nev thinking?" Harry shouted, despite that. Because of it, more like. "Luna Lovegood! This is the bloody Mirror that shows you all you desire, okay? Not what's r **eal—** what you _desire_! Get it? It's not good!"

Infuriated, he grabbed at his friend's bent elbow, giving it a good shake.

"See how that could be a very bad thing, Luna?"

Wild eyes swung betwixt and between each of the three others about him, but only one was actually listening, it seemed. Because Lovegood clearly wasn't, chattering on and on about painted backdrops, and Neville the prat was concentrating only on Looney, the alien girl in tight clothing.

"Malfoy? Yes? Are _you_ listening to me, now? I hope so!" Harry waggled his eyebrows meaningfully at the only person who seemed to care he was pitching a fit in public; Malfoy shrugged back in puzzlement, his own eyebrows arching ever higher. "No?"

Then, back to Nev, his old friend in Gryffindor.

"Oh, hell, Nev? Neville Longbottom, by Merlin's saggy bollocks, come on now! Take your eyes off Luna's cleavage and pay attention!"

Neville, the twat, remained deaf as a post, his lips moving but no words issuing. Harry might as well have ceased to have existed.

Harry did stamp that foot. Loud as the crack of gunshot.

"Oh please, you guys! It's—it's not a good show, not ever a good show, seeing before you every damned day what you can't have and what you never will have! And the Mirror simply can't be allowed to remain, just for anyone to look into, to maybe see—people will be harmed!"

"Good gods, Potter," Malfoy murmured, glancing warily at his fellow thespians, "you're really a bit of a drag over that old thing, aren't you?" He cocked a thumb at the Mirror from Hell.

P'raps it was the level of general excitement Harry was generating in the very air molecules about him that finally captured Luna's attention again; Harry didn't care. He only breathed a sigh of relief over it, pleased.

"Oh, there you are, Harry; I was wondering where you'd got to." But Lovegood deigned to cease her all-engrossing theatrical natter with Neville for only the one instant. She spent it patting Harry's arm kindly and smiling at nothing much in particular. Then she turned away, various bits of fabric swirling. "Good to see you, thanks for coming. Nev, _I_ think—"

"Luna!" Harry exclaimed, determined. "Now, look, Luna—about Erised? It can't—you can't—Make it go away, damn it! You brought it here; heave it out, will you? It cannot stay! Luna? Luna!"

"Shush!" Luna cast him an all-forgiving glow and a little elbow-nudge Malfoy's way, brushing him off. "Don't be silly, Harry; it's mostly harmless, it is. Now, talk to Draco; he's been waiting on you for ages, for your lessons. Here, Nev, what I'm wanting next is—and then the thing we talked about? You know the _thing_ -thing? Can you do it?"

And then she was gone off again, off helter-skelter into a flood of staging technicalities with Nev nodding left and right and looking very interested in all she said, entirely enraptured, leaving Harry abandoned to a renewed swelter of ire.

"Luna!" he moaned, disregarded and knowing it. "Luna!"

"Here, no. Don't do that. What, Potter?"

Draco Malfoy, on the other hand, drew nearer Harry still, but he wasn't reacting the way he should've, nor the way he used to, before, in the Bad Old Days...not in Harry's professional opinion. He was still smiling at Harry faintly, though the twist of his mouth was laced with...was that 'concern'?

"Look, never mind _her_ ; she's barking. Tell _me_ , alright? What is this about, now? What d'you mean, when you said it 'shows you all your desire'? Why would people be injured by something like that? I should think it would be really super, having a mirror show me what I want. I mean, I'd like to know for certain what it is I require out of life, even if _you_ don't. It's a good thing, really; brilliant. And you? You have to relax, mate. Don't get so worked up about it."

"Re-Relax?" Harry stuttered, appalled, eyeballs rolling back in his head. "Whaaat? How can I relax with this thing here? Are you fricking crazy?"

"Huh." Malfoy threw out an arm to indicate the Mirror. "Perfectly sane, thanks, by all reports, and I still don't see the problem. Where's the harm in having a goal? More than that, a visible one? Something to, ah, set your sights on, as it were? Oh, oi!" He chuckled softly at Harry's horrified expression, tipping his head towards to the elegant frame so that tendrils of white-gold hair dangled rakishly before one wintery eye. "Hah! It's a bit fun, yeah? And but think of all the _pun_ we could have with it, too. Like a captive Fortune-Teller thingy-ma-jig, the ones they have in those Muggle funfairs, but right here in Malfoy. Um..Harry? 'Pun'...I said." He stuck a quick elbow into Harry's heaving ribcage, watched him gape in outrage. "I did say...er, d'you follow? That was a joke, you know? Not much of one, sorry, Harry, but still...and all."

" **GAH**!"

"Pardon?"

"You arsehole!"

Harry faced up to the tentatively grinning Malfoy like some bloody mad top, vibrating with anger, literally.

"You utter nincompoop! Oh, my-effing-fracking-fucking gawds, could you manage to be even a little serious, for once? No— _be_ fucking serious, Malfoy. For me, for my sake! This is no joke, this, far from it. And yes, of course it's fascinating, it's Erised; no one claims it isn't, that's the whole point—but it's bloody fucking poison, is what. It'll suck you in if you look at it for too long a time, just like it did me, alright, okay? _Alright_? Do you hear what I'm saying to you? The Mirror saps you, of all your strength—your free will! Your _choices_ , damn it. And no mercy; you won't want to stop looking into it. No, you can't stop looking, no matter what you do. Malfoy, I'm telling you for once and for all, people have up and died because of this Mirror! Died, damn it! It has to go, right now!"

"Right now?" And unabashed Malfoy only crinkled his pale forehead. "...But, Potter—it only just arrived. And...it's bloody _furniture_."

"No! Just stop! Don't bother, alright? Luna? Luna will know." Harry lunged again towards the girl, planting himself firmly between she and Neville and before her beguiling nose. He gripped furiously but carefully at the thin bared shoulders rising swan-like and very attractively above the artistically-sagging boatneck muslin smock she wore. "Luna? Can you see me? Nod if you can, that's it. Please?"

She blinked at him, pale blue eyes not seeing a thing.

"...Maybe a backdrop instead," she muttered. "For the fire scene...and then, for the grand entry...hmm..."

"Right, okay. Nev?" Harry spared a worried, frantic glance but the man was in a fugue state, it seemed, his mind elsewhere apparently as he stared off into a far corner, tapping a forefinger to his chin and mumbling some nonsense about dry ice incantations and devices. "No good—oh, forget it. Sod you, mate. **Luna**. Listen."

Harry resigned himself to focussing on convincing the one important person, the instigator, at least, even if the other two were variously uncaring of all his sound-and-fury. Well...Malfoy might very well be interested, but he wasn't leaping to actually do anything useful about it. It clearly feel to Harry to fix this abomination!

"Luna!"

"Ooh...?" With a start, Lovegood seemed to come to. Again. "Oi?" One could never tell, not with her. Nonetheless, she smiled at Harry, sweet as pie with whip. "Hey...Harry? What's that matter with you? Something up? You should be at practise, right?" She frowned gently. "I swore Granger had 'Practise' on the sched—"

"Yes? Great!" Harry steadied himself as he continued to clutch at her, breathing rapidly and easing slowly up on his grasp, careful not to snag her wildly cascading hair. "Good!" He drew his hands away at last, as though releasing the rock he'd been clinging to in some metaphorical torrent. "Are you with me, here? I've something to say to you."

"What, Harry? Tell me." She, contrarily, seemed entirely unaffected by his emotional dissarray, only regarding him mildly. "I'm all ears...well, no." She smiled. "Not really. That would be pretty ugly, wouldn;t? But go on?" It was infuriating, yes, but not near as infuriating as Malfoy's nonchalance. "Speak; I'm listening."

"Yes, do tell," Malfoy urged, bending his head nearer, as if to eavesdrop. "More, at least. Of your reasoning. I'm...interested in what's got your wind up, Potter. You're not normally so...well." He coughed, loking briefly discomfitted.

"Shut up, Malfoy; not now," Harry hissed. "Luna! Luna, it's like this. Erised?"

He gathered himself together with a great sigh and stuggled to speak calmly ansd reasonably. He felt so in earnest, so deathly determined, he quite thought it was pouring out from his pores, setting up the stink of fear in the air about them.

"I know about this one," he said, glancing down at his own hands. "You see?" They were shaking, so he curled them into fists and faced up to it manfully. "It's what nearly ruined my life, back in our First Year. With Quirrel...the Stone, and then because of Voldemort being after me, remember? Dumbledore had to take the Mirror away in the end and hide it or I'd have stayed looking at it forever, Luna. And so—it's this."

"Hmm, Harry?"

Harry drew a deep cleansing breath, shaking off the memories. There was no time to dwell now.

"And so," he sighed, "what I'm telling you is you simply must send it back to Hogwarts, or where ever it came from—and now, not later, not when you get 'round to it, alright? But now. This instant. Stuff it back into whatever hole you and Nev dragged it out from; stick it down in the bloody dungeons or in the—in the old Room, I don't care which or where, but far, far away from everyone you know, Luna—from us! Really, I don't care where it goes, bloody well burn it if you want—but it cannot stay here! It musn't!"

"But, Potter? It's...I don't understand you."

Malfoy's tone was genuinely puzzled. He'd stepped up to stand close by Harry's side and thus only a few feet back from the offending pier glass. He peered at it sidelong, as if at some strange new species of dragon had just presented him...and he was considering if it might be inclined to bite, but concluding all the while just as likely wouldn't.

"Shut it, will you please?" Harry snarled at him, retreating. "Malfoy, for god's sake, don't get in my way here!"

"There's nothing unusual, though," Malfoy went on, musing aloud and openly staring at Erised. "It's only a mirror. That's all it is. Look, Harry." He pointed a forefinger, indicating the image shining clear and unwavering back at them. "See for yourself, yeah? It's only you and me there, right? And the ballroom. behind us. And Looney, and Longbottom. And...then everyone, all of us. Exactly as it should be. There's nothing there other than that, nothing out of place. I don't follow with exactly why you're so—"

"Harry?" Neville chimed into the four-square equation, for the first time. "Draco's right. It's all good, Erised. It's only a plain old pier glass now, like any other one."

"What?" Harry spun to face his childhood nemesis, startled. No—the other one. The one Headmaster had chided him for being taken in by, and had whisked away subsequently. "What, all good, is it? I don't think so, mate! Just look—look!"

"...Look?"

"Yes, look!" Reluctantly, he peered at it too, the Mirror. He'd avoided really staring at it from the moment he'd realized what it was—mortally afraid he'd see all those he'd lost. His parents, Sirius...everyone. Snape, even. Sneering and such, but Snape. He'd even missed him, the old bastard. But...but?

But sure enough, it was only him and Malfoy reflected in the smokily silvered glass, with Nev and Luna on the very edges, blurrily and the group beyond—and that was what actually _was:_ Harry and Malfoy, standing before it, gazing.

"That can't be!"

Still...it was. The bloody Mirror had trumped him, simply via basic reflection.

"Harry?" Luna cocked her head, ringlets of blonde hair cascading down as she twisted nimbly to flap an arm before his wrinkled-up nose. " _It is_. We tested it, remember? I had said to you, just now; maybe you didn't hear? But it's okay, Harry, really. We wouldn't do anything so stupid as what you're thinking, not with a living Object. The Mirror's dead now, Harry. It's just...dead. Caput. Not even sleeping."

"What?" Harry gasped, disbelieving. "No!"

Had the Mirror actually up and lost its purpose, its Magic?

Harry pondered that for instant before shaking his head.

No. Not possible; he knew from Aurors the Old Magic never let go, never.

"I…don't understand," he faltered, bemused and bewildered. "Malfoy, what is it _you actually_ see in the blasted thing? What do you see beyond...other than what's obvious? Tell me!"

"Well, if you insist." Malfoy cleared his throat, standing taller than ever."Ahem."

"I insist!"

"Umm."

The man considered carefully, looking over the image of the two of them, standing, Harry with hands behind his back, Draco with his casually ticked in his denim's pockets.

"Well?"

"Right. Again, nothing much out the way, Potter. There's the usual chairs lined up against the wall." Draco made sure to point them out. "There. And the pianoforte. And see? There's Brown and her minions and then some others who've joined up, don't kow them all, sorry, but trotting about all the same. The Floo going—see the flames? That's likely Granger coming along; she said she would earlier. And you, Potter. Looney. Me. Longbottom. That's it."

He shrugged.

"Nothing more? Nothing...odd? Weird, strange...different?"

"No."

"I! I...?" Harry shook his head over it. "I...don't."

Nothing was as it should be...nothing!

"Potter?" Malfoy made a noise, a soft half-whistle emerging from his pursed lips, eyebrows cocked in gentle query as he returned his gaze to meet Harry's anxious green one. Humped a sloping shoulder and grimaced. "Harry, look. If this thing was magical at some point, well, I'd wager maybe it's broken beyond repair now. Headmaster Dumbledore nixed it, you said? Well, he was pretty powerful, remember? Or perhaps Hogwarts itself has nullified it in the meanwhile, somehow? Stranger things have happened, you know. I mean, there's a lot of reasons a Magical Object can lose its Magic. It's nothing unusual. You're all het up over not much of anything, I think. I don't believe you need be, now. It's just an old mirror, really; nothing special."

"Oi! Draco? You should call him Harry, Draco," Luna remarked, barging her smiling face in while Harry gawped at Malfoy's advice. "And Harry?"

He jumped. "Er?"

"You should address Draco as Draco. Really. It's only polite of you. Both of you."

"Erm?" Harry gulped, blinking. "Oh...kay?"

"Right, then, Looney." Draco pulled a face, a silly one, and gave Lovegood a mocking little half-bow. "'Harry' it is, then. Right... _Harry_. Not as though I haven't been, sometimes; did you even notice it, Lovegood? I've been all that is polite to my guests, I should say. So?" He smirked at her, but even Harry could see he was in a teasing mood. "You're barking up the wrong Whomping Willow, you know that? I've been a very decent sort, lately. You've even said more than once you like it, right?"

"That's true!" Lovegood smiled up at him sunnily, all sparkles. "You've been a trooper, Draco; always so helpful and pleasant. And you smile at me, too, and I don't even have to remind you." She patted Malfoy's arm and beamed up at him, as if he'd just done her some huge favour. "Thank you so much, Draco."

"Welcome, Lovegood," Malfoy beamed back, apparently caught up in a fit of uncommon mutual good will. "It's my pleasure, really. The Manor really appreciates having you all here; a little life in the old bones, yeah? Oh!" He swivelled his chin about towards Harry. "Ah, Harry. Time's wasting and we should be about those lessons, alright? You ready for me?"

"What? Hey! You!"

"Mmm?"

"That's it? That's all there is to it?" Harry, dumbfounded, was still stuck back on Malfoy's recounting of what he'd seen...or not seen, as the case apparently was. "Just...just this room, just us? Nothing else, _nothing_? Malfoy! Are you certain that's all you see in it?"

"Draco, Harry," Luna reminded him kindly. "Draaaa-coh! Like that."

"Uh-uh." Harry was treated to the very last remnants of Malfoy's shared Looney Luna-grin, a scintillating thing when spread about at random. He blinked at it. "Nope, nothing, sorry. Anyway, er...shall we?"

"I dont." Harry bent forward at the waist and clutched at his hair, frustrated. "I just don't..."

"It's alright; don't be so cross over it." Mafloy reached over to pat his back, shaking his head dolefully, a side to side motion that sent his trademark pale hair wafting gently. "It's just there's nothing out of the ordinary here, _Harry._ Not in Malfoy, not any longer. It's only an old mirror. Hasn't uttered a single word to anyone since Looney and Longbottom brought it, not even to tell Looney here to hike up her blouse when it fell down. Hasn't done much of anything to anyone other than take up space...and, ah. Reflect things."

"That's **not** what it does, Malfoy," Harry snapped, stomping closer to get a good look at the faded carving up the top of Erised. "It doesn't talk, git. It reflects!"

He stared, warily. But no. It seemed what Malfoy reported was true enough. Harry blinked and took of his spectacles to polish them, just to ensure they weren't smudged. He put them on again with the air of man who had unfinished business.

"Doesn't talk? Really? I thought they all did."

"Not all of them, twat! Bloody Magical Mirror, alright? Does what it wants, doesn't it? It's old and it's canny and it's devious when it wants to be, isn't it? Get with the programme! I'm not fucking with you, Malfoy; I'm worried!"

"Draco, Harry, dear!" Luna sang out. " _Draco_. Remember?"

Both Wizards ignored her.

"Oooh! Touchy, touchy, Harry; you're obviously super-sensitive, but, hey alright." Malfoy grinned. "Sorry. Didn't mean to keep pressing that last nerve of yours."

"Forget it," Harry returned shortly, back to examining every inch of Erised-the Ex. Which did nothing untoward at all to him in devious retaliation. He glowered at it, not trusting for an instant, and stared down his own frown suspiciously. "Doesn't matter, Mal—

"Draco, Harry."

"Er, Draco."

"That's nice," Luna nodded happily; Harry could see her in the Mirror. "Well done, you two; a much more natural effort. With practise...well. I am so pleased, yes? Aren't you pleased, too, Neville? Look how they're rubbing along now, Harry and Draco." She budged up to a thoughtful Neville, a taciturn spectator to the Harry-Draco-Mirror minor meltdown show all through. Harry made sure to throw a blistering scowl his way, recalling his utter lack of moral support earlier. "Isn't it pleasant?" Luna persisted. "I think it is. I do like it when people rub along. Everyone should, really. Let's all try it, okay? Okay!"

"But, Luna, wait. I can't..." Harry leant forward to touch the glass, but cautiously, as he'd been trained to do in Aurors. None of the wandless, wordless spells he'd been furiously sending the Mirror's way in the last moment or two had come back to him with anything at all. Nothing bad, at least. It was clean as a whistle, Erised. Harmless. "I just can't...quite...believe it. How could this be? How could it change so much? Do you know?"

No desire, no yearning, no pining away for what might've been. Only an fusty old piece of furniture, and yes, it was as Draco pointed out, a very large glass, expansive. Good for fitting costumes, good for a spot of self-rehearsal. Nothing more.

"Harry...?" Malfoy poked him gently on the upper arm; he'd never given Harry his space back, in all this time. "Harry, if it's truly upsetting you to that degree, I could maybe have it moved?" He glanced towards Luna, still bobbing her chin merrily. "You think Lavender would mind if I had it shifted, Lovegood? There's an anteroom next door, empty mostly. Can shove it in there and still have it accessible enough. Then our Harry here won't be forced to see it if he doesn't want."

"Oh, er? Thanks, Mal—" Harry flushed, embarassed but pleased. " **Oi**!"

"Oh, Harry," Luna had rushed Harry, to enfold him a shatteringly tight embrace. She was reassuringly herself, too; sharp again and not so vague, so Harry hugged her in return, gratefully. "Old Magic does that, at times. It eats itself up." As if Harry had not just had the shock of his life. "It _is_ safe; you have accept that it is and move on. Naught but a big useful mirror—exactly what Brown requires for her sewing up. And remember? I told you before. Nev ran a wand over it first thing when he came across it at Hogwarts. Very first thing, Harry. And me as well, when he firecalled me and I stopped over to see it later-see if it would be suitable."

"Suitable?" Harry laughed bitterly. "Suitable! Hah! As if! Urgh!"

"It's clean and clear, believe me," Luna went on gently. "It was in one of those abandoned classrooms off the fourth floor corridor—you recall them, right? We all used to snog in them, back in the day. Just sitting there, minding its own business. It looked like it wanted to be useful, so of course Neville here thought of us. That's it, all there is to it, Harry. It's," she shrugged philiosphically, "just a prop now...maybe. Least, I think I can use for the Shakespeare play, you know the one, right?"

"...A prop, uh-huh. Right, okay." Harry nodded vaguely. Flushed a dark shade of crimson, too, because _he'd_ not had a great deal of time available to him back at Hogwarts for such vapid things as snogging. And, anyway, snogging had been wet and a little icky and, well. "Wait!" He shrugged, frowning, discomfitted. "Yeah? All those old classrooms were really used for snogging, Luna? I thought that was just Ron, talking out his arse."

She grinned at him, wide and brilliant. "Yes, of course they were, Harry. Didn't you know?"

Malfoy snorted quietly and meaningfully at Harry's elbow, but thankfully didn't pursue it. Harry manfully restrained himself from glaring at his host too, too balefully.

"It _was_ lucky, really—I'd just been wishing for a glass big enough—"

Luna released him in a flood of chatter, going on and on about the lucky discovery. Harry tuned her out, peeking furtively.

Just behind him and to one side was Draco Malfoy, clad in jeans and a loose button-down shirt, elven-style leather slippers on his elegantly long, narrow feet.

"Hmm." Malfoy buzzed in his ear. "We'll have it out of here, yeah? I mean, you should be comfortable too, right? You're just as important as everyone else here, maybe more so, being the star power. And I was already thinking Lavender might require a more private space for her work."

"Yeah," Harry agreed, nodding. "Yeah—I guess. But...I'm not a star, Ma-er-ah. _Draco_. Least, not the only star, no matter what Looney might've told you."

"Okay, then." Beside him Malfoy smiled wide and shiny white. "Thanks." A charming expression that would doubtless earn him all the real kudos, Harry was sure, from all the ladies in the first night audience—and likely half the Wizards attending, too. The git really was very fit. There was no denying it.

"I'll ask the elves to move it out immediately, shall I? Then it won't bother you at all, Harry. You need to ease up, right? You've got a job of work before you, learning lines, mastering the 'business' and all the stagecraft bit. Can't have you suffering a breakdown, no. You'll have to be all dramatic for us for real soon enough."

"Yeah," Harry sighed, closing his eyes. "Sod it, I know. I do know...Draco." He huffed, noticing finally the ornate and very frilly costuming Lav was hefting as she brushed by them. "Great, super. Thanks for reminding me, git." He scowled. "I was trying to forget why I was even here."

"Speaking of, let's get on with that session, eh?" his tutor requested, taking Harry by an elbow. "We've not much time, now, and today's work is all taken from this quaint colonial play I've just discovered. American—so outré. It's fascinating, really, what they come up with across the Divide. _A Streetcar Named Desire;_ have you heard of it?"

"Huh?" Harry jolted, pausing, catching the sparkle of fun in Draco's light eyes. "A streetcar named...erm, what, now? Exactly?"

"Desire. Ironic, mmh? Funny old coincidence, yeah? No?" He flipped his hair off his forehead when Harry didn't instantly chuckle along with him. "Hmm, right, sorry. Come along with me, then. We'll be outside today, I believe, on the balcony. You'll be called upon to shout a lot, and it's much quieter there. You can shout at the peacocks. They like it, rather."

"Oh, er," Harry's shoulders slumped as he was herded off to a set of French doors. "Whatever. Honestly, I feel a little like shouting now, so...let's just get this over with, alright? I hate to say it but I've paperwork still awaiting me, back at the office."

"Oh? That's a pity," Malfoy seemed cast down, suddenly. "We were planning to order in some Muggle tomato pie later from down the Village—have a little social, all together. Sure you can't stay for it? Not even one slice?"

"Well…." Harry, for some reason, instantly felt tremendously guilty. He stared at his boot tips, flushing. "Um?"

"Well!" Draco huffed triumphantly, pale gaze sharp and brilliant where it lingered. "One slice, then." He nodded once and shoved Harry right through the doors. "That's all settled, isn't it?"


	8. Stage II: The Doll House  Act 2, Scene 1. Malfoy Manor, Family Quarters, South Wing, Lucius Malfoy's 'New' Study.

**Stage II:** _The Doll House_

**Act 2, Scene 1.** Malfoy Manor, Family Quarters, South Wing, Lucius Malfoy's 'New' Study.

Present are Lucius Malfoy, aged fifty-odd: a tall man with the Malfoy signature hair and a certain air of a weary _savoir faire_. Clearly a man of the world and a wealthy one, Lucius Malfoy's face also betrays signs of a premature aging: there are pronounced wrinkles 'round his well-cut lips and traced across his pale, high forehead. He sports a very stubborn, somewhat angular chin, with a faint cleft to it, and extremely pale blue eyes—similar to his wife, Narcissa's, though she is not present on stage and it cannot be remarked by a viewer. Lucius is clad in semi-formal traditional robes of dark grey material over closer-fitting, well-tailored trousers beneath. His torso is garbed in a very fine lawn mint-green blouson-style shirting, with silken cord lacing at the throat and a faint frill to each flowing sleeve. His trousers are tucked neatly into knee-high riding boots of Horntail leather, highly polished, and he carries a set of matched riding gloves in one white well-kept hand and a short-handled wand in the other, bejewelled at the hilt and clearly Shrunken down from its regular proportion.

In the room also there is one Draco Malfoy, the only child of Lucius and Narcissa. His features bear this out; there are any number of similarities from father to son. Draco is sprawled across a tufted settee upholstered in a muted old gold fleur-de-lis printed silk, and is clad in Muggle-style clothing that contrasts vividly to his surrounds: pale blue, acid-washed button-fly denims in the latest Muggle fashion and a bright red tee-shirt, imprinted with the words 'Wizards Wield Wicked Wands—Wotcher?' He is barefoot, unshaven and has clearly not combed his hair after bathing—the same white-blond shade as his father's, it is, if not a hue lighter. His eyes are what could be called 'grey', but are actually a changeable colour that absorbs pigment from his surroundings. They are narrowed upon his father's face at the moment and the whole of the young man emanates a sense of vibrant energy—and a welling up of slight, politely stifled ire.

* * *

"I don't think so, Father," the younger Malfoy drawls languidly. "I invited them here and I'm not running them off. It's as much as my job's worth."

"It's ridiculous!" Lucius Malfoy paces, swishing his foreshortened wand so that it slaps against the leather of the gloves he carries. "Our home is not a circus, Draco! We do not play host to any riffraff off the street! I demand that you tell them all to take themselves off at—"

"No, Father." Draco's tone is flat. His features take on a decidedly determined cast; the chin he shares with his sire is firm and thrust out proudly, for all that the lines of his twenty-something self remain relaxed and at ease. "I will not. This is my home, too, Father—I nearly died to keep it so. And this is work I've taken on for myself, so deal. I'm not telling them anything, thank you."

"Draco!" Lucius huffs. "I don't believe you quite understand me. This is our home, Draco—our castle, as it were. I will not have it invaded by the likes of those ruffians you spend your time with, job or no job!"

"Why not, Father?" Draco flaps a set of pale fingers, long and well-articulated. "Mum's alright with it. And they're hardly in your way; a whole regiment could lose themselves here. I don't see the problem."

"Draco," Lucius Malfoy lowers his voice to a hiss, coming to a halt and glaring at his heir. "Just because your poor deluded mother has agreed to this does not make it somehow palatable. Again, send these people on their way. Pack up all their gee-gaws and whatnots and toss them out. I'm sure they can find some other meeting place for this appalling hobby you've taken up—just not here, Draco!"

"Father," Draco sighs. "Get with the times. First you want me to play nice with the Muggleborns and so forth—act like we've been alright with it all along. Then you want me to slither my way into the Ministry—maybe take up your old position? I don't think so—they trust me as far as they can hurl me, and that's the truth, Father. You know it."

"Well, really, Draco," Lucius huffs, again. "I'm certain that if you would just apply yourself for once—"

"I am, Father," Draco cut in neatly, surgically. "That's just it. I am. You and your bloody Dark Lord dealt me a lousy hand. I've got to make the best of it—and this is the best. I can only get so far wrestling dragons. So, er—deal. Just let me do what I need to do."

"But that git Potter's here, Draco!" Lucius comes as close as he ever allowed himself to wailing. "And he's perfectly ghastly, as usual. No manners whatsoever, and I really don't care whether his childhood experience was troubled, such matters are still important. Even the bloody Muggles have some sort of proper behaviour—"

"Have you ever thought, Father," Draco finally sits up straight, planting his hands on his knees and staring challenging at his papa, "that perhaps he does not like you? That he's rude for a reason? Because he's not, otherwise. Not at all, Father. It's only you, really."

"What does that mean, Draco?" Lucius demands. "You're saying this is deliberate? And in my own home, when I've not even formally invited him? That's—that's absolutely unacceptable!"

"Dad, Dad, come on," Draco very seldom addresses his _pater familias_ so familiarly; that he has done so now is an indication that not all is quite so unperturbed beneath his mellow, casual exterior. "You tried to off him, Dad. He doesn't like you, alright? That's the end of it and you have no say about it."

"Excuse me?" Lucius sneers. "I very much have a say, Son. I can ward him out in an instant-and don't think I won't!"

"Maybe you can, at that," Draco nods, "but that doesn't help us, Dad. It doesn't help me and it won't make it any better in the long run. You'll just perpetrate the same old shit that got us into this mess in the first place. I said before, Dad—deal. Get over it and deal. This is the way it is now."

"And you go along with it, Draco? Just like that?" Lucius's voice is venomous. "Where is your Malfoy pride, Son? Are you a fan of Potter's now, just like every other hoodlum and Mud—"

"Don't say it, Father!" Draco's voice is a whip-crack; it slices neatly through the hateful word 'Mudblood', dissecting it to shreds and ribbons. "Or _I_ won't be responsible—not now, not any more—never again. And neither will Mum. You know how she feels about that, Father."

"I haven't the faintest idea of what you're talking about, Draco," Lucius snorts, "But in my day, a young man did well when he paid heed to his father's advice—"

"That's exactly the trouble, Dad," Draco retorts. "I've been there and done that and look where we are now, yeah? I can't find a real job here; you're effectively forcibly retired from any political life and Mum is shunned half the time when she goes out to the shops. Not even the Continent is the way it was, once, Father—you seem to have conveniently forgotten that!"

"Draco, Draco, Draco," Lucius sighs, moving at last from his looming stance over the settee that holds his son. He strolls to the windows—large floor-to-ceiling ones, French-hinged—and gazes at the view of the Malfoy lands, rolling peaceably off in the distance. "It is you who forgets. We have always been proud, Draco—and we have always been careful of whom we associate with, lest they bring us harm—"

"And?" Draco springs to his feet, slipping silently after him on the silken geometric weave of an antique Arabian carpet. "And that's what you've managed to do, Dad? Associate only with the very best of wizards? I don't think so!"

"No," Lucius sighs once more, and this time heartfelt. Turning slightly, he drops his gloves and wand upon the polished surface of his great desk. "No, Son. I have not. I have failed miserably, which I suppose was to be expected. I was not the first child my mother bore, you recall? It was my elder brother who was meant to steer us all safely. And I've no doubt he would have made the correct choices. I, sadly, did not."

"Uncle Gideon?" Draco frowns. "But he died so young? How—what?"

"Nevertheless, it was my brother Gideon whom Father choose to train, Son. When he…passed, I was but a poor second-best. The spare, Draco. That's what I was born to be and still am. Gideon was the one my father poured all his hope and love into—Gideon. When he…died, my father was a broken, damaged man. He no longer cared whom he harmed or offended. He was mad, I think—at the very end. Hated the entire world, you see."

"Why? What happened? You've never spoken of this before. Not at any length, at least, and Mum knows very little. I've only ever seen his picture, heard his name mentioned in passing."

"Draco, my boy, you're very like him, you know," Lucius smiles, all the lines about his light eyes crinkling in fond pride. "The spitting image, more like—in every way."

"How so? What d'you mean?"

Lucius sighs, shrugging. A hand is flung out, as it to spread an imaginary scene before the wondering eyes of his son—to tell a story, just as Lucius had done often when Draco was but a child in rompers.

"Gideon was kind, Draco. My brother was kind and stalwart, gallant and honourable as the first-born son of a great House should be. If Arthur's Court were still amongst us, my brother would sit but a step below that blackguard Lancelot, he was that noble. But he died—tragically—and it fell to me, and I had only ever been spoilt, Son. I hadn't been expected to make much of myself. There was no need to, really."

"How did he die, Dad?" Draco persists. "Was it to do with a Muggle, perhaps? Because I can't help but think—"

"Exactly so. A Muggle wheeled carriage struck him, quite by accident, mid-Apparition in the High Street of our little Malfoy-on-Lea. A Muggle man of medicine got to him first but he knew nothing of St Mungo's, nothing of wizarding ways of healing. He could not save Gideon—the blow was to his chest and throat and crushing. There was no time. He died in that Muggle's arms, spitting blood, not a half mile from home."

"Ah," Draco remarks. "Yes, then—I see, I think. When Grandfather discovered it—"

"He killed the man, nearly razed the village—and Muggles and Muggleborns were an anathema to our family after that day. My father raised me—I was still quite young, you realize—to hate and despise them….as I have raised you. But that was not Gideon's way, Draco. It was not, as I found out far too late and to my shame, _his_ way. He'd not have wanted it."

"It changed the world, didn't it?" Draco tilts his head. "If he'd lived, the Malfoys never would've thrown all our support in with the agents of the Dark. We'd not have been Death Eaters."

"Perhaps not," Lucius shakes his head, clapping a gentle hand upon his son's collarbone. "Perhaps we would have still. The Death Eaters were not always the tools of He Who Must Not Be Named. I don't know."

"Voldemort, Father," Draco slides in neatly. "Call him that—or call him Tom Riddle, as Harry does. He's gone."

"Yes, yes he is," Lucius nods. "And I must admit to a certain fine sense of gratitude for your Potter. But what I do know, Draco, is that my father instilled a great sense of grievance in me, as soon as he possibly could. And that was the feeling of the time, Son. When Riddle first came into power. The Blacks, the Goyles, the Notts—all of the old families had some bone or another to pick with Muggles and Muggleborns, large or small. We fell for the Dark Lord's words with a will and a fine sense of fervour, Draco—that was no blind mass hysteria, Draco. We were not tricked into following him. No. We allowed it."

"But it could've been different, right, Dad? If Uncle Gideon had lived…or if Grandfather had not hated Muggles so. Or if you'd not become a Death—"

"Son," Lucius smiles gently at the tall young man next to him, who stands shoulder to shoulder and has his chin properly raised and his spine straight, as a Malfoy's ought be. "Son, it is passed, all of it. My choices, my brother's death—Tom Riddle. And you are correct, the future awaits us—nay, it is here, on our doorstep and perhaps it's not as golden as I once conceived it to be. But we have certain standards, Draco—rules we follow, as you know—"

"If you're asking me to boot Harry Potter, Father, I've said I will not do it." Draco sets his lips to a thin line, crossing his arms before his chest. "Forget it."

"Perhaps not, then," Lucius sighs. "But have a care, Draco. He may seem as beguiling as the Dark Lord did, long ago, when I was first introduced to him, but…"

"But nothing, Father!" Draco starts, almost as though he might stomp a bared heel into the plush carpet. But he does not. Manners forbid it. "He's nothing like your Voldemort—he's more than proven that. He saved my arse, Father—he didn't need to do that! You still have me only because Harry bloody Potter took pity, Dad—remember?"

The hand on Draco's shoulder tightens painfully. Lucius winces, rocks back a pace as if to set a little distance between himself and his son.

"Oh, I remember, Draco. I cannot forget—and I will be forever indebted. That does not mean that I admire him, nor his ways. I do not wish to be friends with his friends nor engage socially with him. I do not wish to see him in my home, Draco—but."

"Yes?" Draco's brow rises, in an arc that matches his father's exactly. His voice is grim.

"I will 'deal', Son." Lucius sends Draco a rueful twist of lips, barely more than a grimace of acknowledgement. "As you've requested."

"Good," Draco says promptly, and follows up just as promptly with a question. "Why, Father? Why is that, if you're so dead-set against him and his 'ways' and friends and all that guff— _why_?"

"Draco—my son," Lucius does smile this time, and fondly, his pale blue eyes darkening with pupil, "I had a brother named Gideon, remember? And you're very like what I recall of him—and you deserve at your age to make a few of your own decisions, without us elderly folk hampering you."

"Dad—"

Lucius raises his other hand swiftly, palm flattened, as if to staunch all the words that visibly tremble before his son's parted lips.

"Draco, your mother has counselled me and I am not, despite appearances, entirely either a fool nor an old stick. But I ask that you have a care, nonetheless. I know of your...proclivities, Draco—"

"That's hardly-!"

"I know, Draco," his father speaks over him, "and there are ways to deal with that. The Malfoy line will continue. Never fear. But do not, as the old saying goes, place all your Humdingers in the one green glass bottle, please. Have a care, Draco. He may not, er…feel...for you what you require of him. I am concerned that you will be disappointed."

Draco spins away from the window and his father's grasping fingers, paces the carpet in a smooth flurry of muted molten hue, his motions cat-like but jerkily disjointed, all at once. He comes to a sudden halt before the study door, a dark slab of wood that speaks of ages past, bound as it was with wrought iron hinges and a great hunkering lock. Clenches his two hands into loose fists at his sides and tosses his elegantly moulded head defiantly, though his father remains still behind him, saying nothing.

"I know that," Draco replies flatly. He curls his lip at the door. It screams of the safety to be found in a fortress, for Malfoy Manor despite all its clean Norman notes architecturally, and despite all its pretty Frenchification, is precisely that at heart: a fortress. Designed to keep its inhabitants locked up tight and the world at bay indefinitely.

"I know, if anyone does."

If there is a blood traitor to that fine tradition, arguably it could be the current Malfoy heir—and he is well aware of it. Opening the bastion and allowing them all to stream in; to make use and make merry—it is his fault and his responsibility. But sometimes even the air stagnates; things have to change—his eloquent shrug says as much.

"I accept it, too, Father," Draco swallows hard and glares at the iron knobs. "I take responsibility for all that happens, as well—or will occur. He may not—or he may. I don't know. I haven't a clue either, Dad. I don't. I only know I will not step back from this. This is our chance. My chance. My choice—my life. Alright, Dad?" He gulps again, blinking, and places a steady hand upon the heavy latch, raising its oiled bar. The cold metal warms immediately against the half-moon indentations in his palm, where his own nails have bitten into flesh.

"Son…Draco."

"For once?"

"Fine, fine!" his father hisses, scowling. "Do as you wish, then, and never mind the consequences! But don't blame me if—"

He pauses, as if expecting an explosive reply—a tantrum, perhaps, or a fury of youth. But his son stands quiet and does not turn back. His shoulders speak eloquently for him, as does the unyielding line of his long spine. He's grown one; he's keeping it, thank you—or so his Father sees, at long last.

"Right, then. On your own head be it, Draco. You've made your bed, I see."

Lucius heaves a great breath, falling elegantly into his padded, carven desk chair, the same that had enthroned him in his old study. He stares at his son's rigid spine from the depths of its enfolding safety and raises a palsied hand to shield his eyes, rubbing his furrowed brow.

The sight of his son's set shoulders and proud head awaits him, stark and silent, his slender figure an effigy before the scarred, darkened wood.

"You're a damned fool, boy," he persists. "This is all foolishness of the highest degree and I'm sure you'll suffer for it, whatever your mother may say!"

Not a sound escapes that still, tall form waiting by the exit; not by a single betraying flinch did Lucius' heir indicate he might turn back from his current course.

Lucius, shoulders slumping, fingers of one hand straying to his discarded wand where it lay carelessly splayed on his blotter, sighs and narrows his eyes at his only child. He shrugs.

"Yes…alright, then. As you wish, Draco—as you wish. I concede."

"Thank you."

The door closes soft as a whisper behind him as he pads out on bare soles, toes flexing with relief, with not even the faintest of creaks or screeches: a suitable punctuation point for the discussion that had seemed never-ending.


End file.
